What is David Tokoph, a man the government suspects of gunrunning, doing in South Africa? And what is United Democratic Movement leader Bantu Holomisa doing at his side?
Tokoph, apparently a citizen of both the United States and Italy, is, in his own words, a “substantial businessman”. His air transport interests span at least three continents. In El Paso, Texas, he parks his own F-100 fighter jet, a collector’s dream. Pictures where he poses with two Texan natives, George Bush Snr and George W Bush, decorate the walls of his South African offices in Bruma, Johannesburg.
Tokoph is best known locally as the man who saved regional carrier Interair South Africa from insolvency and became the executive chair of its holding company, Inter-Aviation Services, in 1997. At the same time Tokoph became boss Holomisa accepted a directorship.
But as long as Tokoph’s list of successes is the string of allegations against him. When last year a United Nations investigative panel asked South Africa whether it knew of arms dealers fanning the conflict in the Democratic Republic of Congo, the government’s formal reply included Tokoph on a list of individuals “possibly involved”.
The entry on Tokoph was blunt: “Has been involved in arms smuggling to [Angolan rebel movement] Unita. Tokoph was the MD of a Zambian-based airline called Aero Zambia and, until early in 1999, when he ran away from a possible charge relating to illegal drugs, Tokoph lived in Zambia.”
These allegations cannot be taken as verified fact since the South African reply was not intended for publication and seemed based in parts on raw intelligence. The Zambian “drugs charge” related to his possession of Valium, a pharmaceutical that it is illegal to possess in that country without a prescription. And Tokoph does have some excuses about a medical emergency that necessitated him leaving Zambia soon after his January 1999 arrest.
Yet, the South African government officially suspects Tokoph of gunrunning. And it is not alone in that. For, as Belgian arms researcher Johan Peleman asserts, Tokoph and his planes are “always in the wrong place at the wrong time”.
The “wrong place” has included flights by Santa Lucia Airways, an alleged Central Intelligence Agency front, to Iran in the mid-Eighties. That was part of what later came to be known as the Iran-Contra scandal, an arms smuggling operation that was the Reagan administration’s greatest embarrassment. A Boeing used by Santa Lucia to ferry arms and US personnel to Tehran was reportedly leased from El Paso-based Aviation Consultants, one of Tokoph’s companies.
Tokoph this week said of the allegations: “It’s all bullshit; it is all politics; people who came after me for their own motives.”
He denied knowledge of the Iran-Contra flights. “I’m a man who owns a lot of airplanes and lease them all over the world.” To hold him accountable, he said, was like blaming Hertz when a customer knocked over a child in a rental car.
Holomisa, who in 2000 released a detailed report accusing the government of abetting rebels in Congo, this week denied any knowledge of Tokoph facing comparable allegations.
“I don’t know that side of the story,” he said, but added that if Tokoph had a “not-so-rosy side” he would review their association. He said he wanted to hear Tokoph’s version first.
Holomisa said that he was a non-executive director of Tokoph’s company and had no financial interest, although he had accepted free flights in the past. He joined the board after he had been expelled by the African National Congress and was out of Parliament, he said.
Other allegations made against Tokoph or his companies in recent years include:
In January 1999 the Angolan government, in a formal protest to the Zambian government, listed Tokoph and Aero Zambia, the privatised Zambian national carrier that Tokoph then headed, among alleged sanctions busters to Unita. Zambian authorities suspended Aero Zambia’s licence later that year.
Tokoph, in reply, charges that both the Unita gunrunning and drugs allegations were manufactured by Frederick Chiluba, the then Zambian president, to squeeze him out of business. “Chiluba wanted to have an airline … It’s all African politics.”
In May 2000 Belgian customs officials seized four military choppers at Ostend airport before they could be irregularly transferred to Congo. News reports at the time claimed a Tokoph company was involved in the transport arrangements — allegations that were repeated at a Belgian parliamentary inquiry only four months ago.
Tokoph claims his company was mistakenly implicated by a journalist.
“My lawyer called him and chewed his arse, and it [the allegation] stopped.”
The Johannesburg High Court will on Tuesday hear an application by Total South Africa for the liquidation of Inter-Aviation Services, the Interair holding company. Total claims the company owes it R4,6-million for jet fuel. Tokoph claims Total is “in breach of contract; they’re wrong”.