THE GUPTAS THE END IN SIGHT. DOWNFALL.

As promised here is the final installment on this corrupt family.

The Glencore deal was as dirty as they come. Brian Molefe had moved from Transnet and was now at the power utility Eskom. Negotiations were in place for the supply of a coal contract. The mine in question was Optimum Coal Holdings. It had carried on mining and stockpiling its resources whilst on hold with the negotiations. Molefe arrived and scuttled all negotiations , Optimum filed for bankruptcy. Surprisingly there was an offer to buy them out at a fraction of the cost. It was Teglata holdings, the Gupta owned mining company.

KPMG had also got their hands dirty as they wee asked to draft a letter to Glencore saying no deal was going to happen. They never informed anyone of the dirty deal and that the Guptas were meddling in government departments. Mr Zwane the official who had arranged the Guptas wedding travel plans became Minister of mineral resources and within weeks started doing spot checks on all of Glencore's mines shutting them down. Seeing it was an unfair fight agreed to sell Optimum mining to the Guptas. The mine was basically sold for what the stockpile was worth and not the mine itself. One harsh reality that should have alerted everyone was the price of coal being supplied shot up as soon as the Guptas were involved. Basically they bought a mine for free as the coal stock piles had paid for it.

In early 2016 KPMG was concerned about their dealings with the Guptas and was starting to affect their business. The accountancy firm was the auditor for Eskom and the Guptas businesses and could see the red flags everywhere. However they didn't want to lose the business accounts as this was very lucrative. Since then KPMG has lost a big portion of their business and clients have gone elsewhere.

Over this time McKinsley and Trillian got mixed up with Eskom dealings and these all led back to the Guptas. These firms were going to make Billions and the partners involved were nervous as they couldn't justify the fees being charged. It was for cost cutting efforts for the power utility but you are charging billions for it.Eventually the deal was scrapped and both companies shared $112 million for 6 months work.

There was one more cherry to pick and that was Nuclear power. The Guptas owned a Uranium mine and Zuma was on board to push a new power source that would bring South Africa into the new era. Even when Zuma was losing his grip ,he was still trying to push the Nuclear deal through. It had been rejected by the Finance Minister ,saying the country couldn't afford it. It would have sent the country spiraling downwards as finances were now tight. The Gupta's had taken so much that now there was nothing left.

Other companies started to feel the heat including SAP SE the IT company. They had been helped by the Gupta's for landing lucrative contracts with payments proving who was involved. The banks in South Africa were the final straw for the crooked family. All the major banks refused to have anything to do with them and the only bank left was a Bank Of Baroda office in Johannesburg with a few staff members. Eventually they saw it as too high risk and shut down the operation as well. There were 72 payments made that were found to be suspect and they were all in the millions.

Zuma was planning his new successor and pushed forward one of his wives. She was an even bet in his eyes against Ramaphosa ,and would protect him going forward. It wasn't just about protecting him but all their business interests could carry on as normal with the Guptas. The members of parliament didn't want any drastic changes either as they were all crooked it seems. Ramaphosa won and their world turned upside down.

Over the Zuma period the economic promise has disappeared and the country has been down graded to junk status in the global ratings. No one quite knows how much they have taken out the country and how much they stole but we know it's in the billions of dollars. At one time they purchased the most expensive house in Dubai, had jets and are one of the wealthiest families in South Africa. Atul Gupta was named at number 7 in the rankings with an estimated fortune of $750 million. For someone who declared his annual earnings at $80 000 or less to the receiver of revenue. We may never know the real number stolen but can only guess it is in the 10's of Billions and maybe much much more.

I hope lessons have been learnt but somehow I don't as corruption is still rife. Who knows where South Africa will end up but it has a long road to recovery if it ever does. We are waiting for the trial of Jacob Zuma and the Gupta's and Ramaphosa can win public support by being extremely harsh on them but that is another matter entirely.

Image source. Pininterest.com and campaignme.com