How Guptas got Estina’s R880m

MILKED: COMPLEX ‘MONEY LAUNDERING SCHEME’ Investigator explains money flow to and from ill-fated dairy project.

The Guptas may have received nearly R900 million from the controversial Vrede Dairy Farm project, according to testimony at the Zondo commission yesterday.

The Commission of Inquiry into State Capture yesterday heard an intricate breakdown of money flowing to and from the Gupta enterprise, a series of companies owned by the family, and the Free State Estina Dairy project.

The figures were provided by director of investigations at Shutterworld Investigations in London, Paul Holden, who calculated the total amount of funds received by Estina between

June 2012, and April 2017.

Holden testified that in total the Free State government paid R280 202 652 in eight separate tranches between 9 July 2012, and 5 May 2016.

The Gupta enterprise benefited from the majority of the fund transfers, which were laundered a number of times, before being poured into Estina.

Overall, Holden explained that the complex money laundering scheme saw the Free State government’s funds paid out of Estina and returned back into Estina, to make it seem as though Estina was deriving money from other sources.

However, most of the funds came from the Free State government, he testified.

The grand total of payments that came into the Estina account was R880 345 365 , which included accrued interest. However, just 3.98%, or R35 87 788 was not derived from Free State government funds. Holden said this figure could be even smaller.

The total value of deposits made by the Free State, and the interest on these deposits, amounts to more than R287 million. Of this, R229 038 271.82 was transferred to various companies of the Gupta enterprise.

Gateway Limited received R83 703 664 from Estina’s Standard Bank account, and R85 828 732 from its FNB account. This means Gateway received R169 532 396.

A total of $3 330 700 was transferred to the benefit of Linkway Trading, and $3 350 000 to Oakbay Investments.

R34 563 583 was also paid to the South African Revenue Service (Sars) for VAT obligations.

Of the total amount, R263 601 851 was paid out cumulatively to Gateway, Vagafield and Sars for VAT payments connected to Estina. Of the funds from Free State, R59 505 875 was transferred to Vagafield from Estina’s Standard and FNB accounts.

Of the total funds, R21 746 697 was transferred to accounts other than those previously mentioned, made up of a mixture of payments for the costs of running the dairy enterprise and paying salaries.

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