Agriculture and Land Affairs Minister Lulu Xingwana is being sued for R100 000 by the estranged wife of acting Land Bank CEO Phil Mohlahlane in a divorce suit.
In papers filed this week in the Johannesburg High Court, Mohlahlane’s estranged wife, Joyce, says her husband and Xingwana have conducted an affair since 2006.
She alleges that Xingwana gave her estranged husband ”undue privileges” including overseas trips and ”positions of undue power”.
She also claims Xingwana used her position as minister to protect and give immunity to her husband for the ”various frauds and acts of misconduct he has committed at his place of work”.
These included the use of a cancelled identity document, irregular awarding of tenders at the Land Bank, falsifying information on his CV and mismanagement.
Xingwana, who is unmarried, denies the alleged affair.
The Land Bank has been at the centre of repeated controversies in recent years, including a series of financial scandals. It has been the subject of a number of investigations by the Scorpions.
In March last year, Xingwana suspended Mohlahlane’s predecessor, Alan Mukoki, who had been accused of financial irregularities. After a brief reinstatement, Mukoki quit the bank.
Last November, after a forensic audit, the Scorpions raided the Land Bank’s offices a number of times in search of evidence relating to fraudulent loans. The audit found that bank officials had defrauded the bank of more than R2-billion to fund investments by close friends and business associates.
Mohlahlane, the former deputy director general of agriculture, was appointed in July last year by Xingwana in what was seen as a move to help the embattled bank.
However, his appointment was questioned in December when it came to light that he had two identity documents with different numbers and birth dates — May 16 1954 and December 3 1955 — belonging to a certain Philemon Radichaba Mohlahlane.
The first was issued in 1994 and the second in 2000. The home affairs department confirmed that the 1954 document was no longer valid.
Mohlahlane allegedly used his second illegal identity document to register companies, buy properties and open bank accounts. The Mail & Guardian is in possession of a copy of his marriage certificate, showing that he married Joyce in 1976. The certificate is registered in terms of the 1955 identity document.
More controversy erupted around Mohlahlane at the beginning of the year when he was accused of sexual harassment and Xingwana leapt to his defence. She said neither she nor the bank or its board had received complaints from any of the bank’s employees, adding: ”His position is not in any way under review.”
Xingwana and the Land Bank have also defended Mohlahlane over his two identity documents, saying he had informed the necessary authorities of their existence.
”The department of agriculture and the Land Bank board were satisfied that the second ID had been issued because of his wish to correct an error in the original document,” the statement said.
Mohlahlane is currently not at work and it is unclear why. In February Land Bank officials said he was on ”voluntary leave”.
In the court papers, Joyce Mohlahlane alleges that Xingwana and her husband are in constant cellphone contact. ”These calls, some of which are made late at night, are in excess of what would be deemed reasonable in a normal working relationship,” she alleges.
The M&G‘s calls to Mohlahlane remained unanswered. However, it is understood that he denies that he and Joyce are married.
Ministerial spokesperson Mdhluli said there was an attempt to discredit Xingwana and Mohlahlane and that the ministry was only aware of a marriage between Mohlahlane and another woman, Mamie Mojapelo, the second respondent in the divorce suit. He declined to comment further.