Weekend Argus (Saturday Edition)
Kouwenhoven wife’s ‘A-list’ life
Convicted Dutch gunrunner refuses to disclose source of his wealth to court
A FORMER model with Parisian roots, Jenny Kouwenhoven is known in A-list circles as the glamorous owner of Lume Beauty Atelier, a glittering gold and glass luxury boutique spa in De Waterkant.
The Ivorian mother of twins featured in an array of glossy fashion and design magazines and at this year’s Cape Town International Jazz Festival’s gala dinner, dressed in a stunning red dress, she was named “Most Stylish Female”.
But it emerged in the Cape Town Magistrate’s Court this week that all this glitz and glamour is a far cry from her husband’s “blood-money” past.
Jenny’s R6 million spa and the jaw- dropping R90m fivestorey Bantry Bay villa she calls her first real home in 18 years, were listed as assets in this week’s bail application hearing of her husband, convicted Dutch war criminal and gunrunner Guus Kouwenhoven, 75.
These assets, plus another nearby R60m Bantry Bay luxury villa, also in De Wet Road, are all fully paid up and co-owned by the couple who are married in community of property, the court heard this week.
Kouwenhoven derived an undisclosed income from the spa, plus an R18 000- a- night rental from his Villa Mon Reve. He recently sold another paid- up property in Hoopoe Avenue, Camps Bay for R12m, his advocate Laurence Hodes SC informed the court.
His luxury vehicles, all paid for, include a gold 2013 Porsche Panamera, a 2015 Mercedes V220 CDI and a 2015 Range Rover Vogue which his wife Jenny hailed on Thursday following her first appearance in court this week to support her husband. She was not present at his earlier hearings as she had been holidaying in Paris.
Addressing the source of Kouwenhoven’s considerable wealth, estimated by Dutch sources to be over e40m, State advocate Christopher Burke pulled no punches.
“He said he owns a company but not what this company does. He does not answer the allegations of his friendship with the president of, and his logging rights in, war-torn Congo-Brazzaville at all.
He does not reveal where these millions upon millions come from. He wants bail but does not play open cards with this court. There is, however, no need to speculate as to the source of these extravagant luxuries. It was the very crimes he was convicted of that made him so wealthy. This is all bloodmoney.”
Describing Kouwenhoven as a fugitive from justice and the “prototype of a flight risk” who must be kept in custody pending the outcome of his extradition hearing, Burke argued that South Africa could not be seen as a haven for convicted criminals.
Kouwenhoven’s “opulence” said Burke, “came at the cost of pillaging a poor African country while supplying weapons to one of the most notorious warlords of our time. Weapons that led to the murder of count- less civilians”.
Kouwenhoven had been known as “Mister Gus” in Liberia, where he ran two timber companies in the early 2000s and used them as cover to smuggle arms, according to the Dutch court.
At the time, Liberia had been in the grip of a civil war between then-president Charles Taylor’s government and several rebel factions.
Liberia’s string of conflicts since the 1990s left an estimated 250 000 people dead. Thousands more were mutilated and raped and all sides in the conflict used child soldiers.
Taylor stepped down in 2003. He was arrested in 2006 and in 2012 sentenced by the Special Court for Sierra Leone to 50 years in prison for aiding and abetting war crimes in neighbouring Sierra Leone.
Kouwenhoven arrived in Cape Town in December last year, ostensibly for medical treatment. This was during a lengthy appeals process in the Dutch courts which finally came to a head in April this year when he was sentenced in absentia to 19 years in jail for selling weapons to Taylor.
Citing medical reasons Kouwenhoven refused to return to the Netherlands to serve his sentence and an Interpol red notice was issued.
He was arrested at his villa on December 8 and is being held in a Sea Point Police Station cell until judgment on his bail application is heard on Tuesday.
This week Kouwenhoven’s lawyers argued for a return to his luxury villa, possibly even under house arrest, arguing Kouwenhoven was not a flight risk and should be granted bail as he was a dying man with a life expectancy of three years.
Incarceration in overcrowded, unhygienic Pollsmoor while awaiting an extradition request from the Netherlands to be finalised would kill him, they argued.
During argument, the defence listed Kouwenhoven’s medical problems, made stark by their request to the court to hand a bag full of medications to him in the dock.
They painted a picture of a man on his last legs, unable to take care of himself let alone survive a flight back to a Dutch court even though for the past six years he has been flying in and out South Africa until December 2016, when he settled here on a temporary residence visa.
The State doesn’t believe Kouwenhoven is as ill as he claims, citing surveillance reports before his arrest of him driving himself around Cape Town in his Porsche. This is contrary to his doctor’s orders contained in his bail application affidavit to avoid contact with people outside his immediate family.
In addition he was spotted at the glitzy no-expense-spared Lume spa launch party in December 2016. And he easily climbed the stairs, the court heard, as he showed arresting officers around his five-storey villa.
Despite the mountain of evidence against Kouwenhoven his lawyer, Gary Eisenberg, pointed out that he had been acquitted of all charges in previous Dutch court hearings.
“What the press has been saying about my client is absolutely crazy. Mr Kouwenhoven is guilty by association, morally, ethically and every other way, by having a business in Liberia under Charles Taylor’s watch.
“My client never smuggled arms. He never touched a firearm. His wealth comes from being a successful businessman in the logging industry. There is no blood money involved.
“He has had nothing to do with killing people or babies or raping women or anything the prosecution is saying about him.”