/ 4 June 2007

Fidentia curators start search for missing R1bn

Former senior Fidentia employees are to be interrogated as the company’s curators hunt for money to return to investors, Moneyweb reported on Monday.

It said at least ten people have received subpoenas for an ”examination” before the curators in terms of the Financial Institutions Act later this month.

They had been asked to bring certain paperwork with them.

The ten had been cautioned they would be guilty of an offence if they refused to cooperate or gave false information.

Co-curators George Papadakis and Dines Gihwala, appointed by the Cape High Court, are searching for at least R1-billion of investors’ funds entrusted to Fidentia entities.

The money disappeared in a spending spree that involved Fidentia buying entities well above market-related prices and paying employees over-inflated salaries, as well as treating them to expensive cars and personal property on the backs of investors.

Many of these investors are widows and orphans who were relying on modest monthly stipends from the Living Hands trust.

There was very little of that money left by the time the curators stepped in to take over at Fidentia.

Former Fidentia chairperson Arthur Brown and accountant Graham Maddock were arrested in March in connection with what appears to be the biggest corporate scandal in South Africa. – Sapa