Tara Turkington
A bus operator in Kimberley has retrenched half his staff and is facing bankruptcy after an empowerment deal set up by the provincial government went sour.
Sabbatha Mathiba once owned the thriving Rainbow Bus Company, ferrying commuters to and from work at the De Beers diamond mines.
But now the company is in ruins and Mathiba is suing Top Gear, a company set up by the Northern Cape Department of Transport to empower himself and three others, and he may sue the department as well.
He claims he has been defrauded of more than R400 000 by Top Gear’s directors, and that the department has turned a blind eye to his problems.
In February a bus company operating four subsidised routes in Kimberley went bankrupt and the provincial government decided to give the contract to disadvantaged operators.
Transport department representative Victor Modise says the department entered into interim agreements with the four companies to operate the routes, but that it was agreed that permits would be granted only in the name of the single company, called Top Gear, from the end of May.
Mathiba says an Absa account was opened in Top Gear’s name in March and two of the operators had signing powers. It was agreed that the department pay each operator’s subsidies into this account. But, he claims, in April the other operators withdrew the subsidy of R98 000 owed to him.
Mathiba says Top Gear’s manager, Rashid Smith, got the bank to cancel his signing powers on the account. For four months the department paid his subsidy into this account. In total, he says, he has lost more than R400 000.
Police are investigating the alleged theft and the bank has frozen the account.
Mathiba claims the transport department was negligent in monitoring the progress of Top Gear and that it continued to pay subsidies owing to him into the joint account even after his lawyer had written a letter explaining the alleged fraud and asking that he be paid directly for services rendered.
Abdul Motlekaar, a consultant who set up Top Gear on behalf of the department, admits that the company owes Mathiba money, “but it’s definitely not the amount he says it is”.
He was unsure when Mathiba might be paid.
Smith says that the company kept subsidies amounting to about R300 000 for the De Beers route for May, June and July to offset ticket sales on the route that should rightfully have been Top Gear’s. He claims Mathiba took the money for the tickets illegally it should have been Top Gear’s since the company held the permit from the end of May. He has laid a charge of fraud against Mathiba for operating this route without a permit.
He also claims Mathiba is lying about the R98 000 from April he claims Mogotsi and Mathiba transferred this money into Mathiba’s account, but could not produce documentation of this.
Mathiba shakes his head sadly. “I had 24 workers and I’ve had to retrench half of them. I put everything into my company, even my provident fund. Top Gear has failed me.
“Can we call this empowerment?”