Businesswoman Danisa Baloyi has repaid an interest-free loan of just less than R8-million she received from financial services company Fidentia Holdings, her spokesperson Dominic Ntsele confirmed on Friday.
He said the amount, of R7,95-million, was repaid to Fidentia’s curators on Wednesday, in the form of two bank cheques.
He said that in making the repayment, Baloyi was honouring the terms of her original agreement with Fidentia, that she would repay the money within 90 days of the loan being called in.
Fidentia’s curators called the loan in February.
Ntsele said interest would have kicked in had Baloyi not met the 90-day deadline. ”She paid in line with the requirements of the agreement. It was never her intention not to pay,” he said.
Baloyi served as a Fidentia director and as a trustee of the Living Hands Umbrella Trust, which the curators claim was looted by Fidentia’s former executive chairperson J Arthur Brown and accountant Graham Maddock.
Fidentia curator George Papadakis said earlier that the Baloyi repayment was the only chance of meeting the trust’s obligation to 47 000 widows and orphans in May.
Baloyi relinquished all her posts with companies and non-government organisations in March. This followed her removal from the board of the Absa Group and Absa Bank.
She has also stepped aside as chancellor of the University of Fort Hare.
In March this year, she said: ”I have … decided to resign from all boards and positions that I hold in public and private organisations in order to dedicate all my energies to the challenges I face.” — Sapa