Conman 'swindled over R41m'
2008-07-30 09:33
Pretoria - An alleged conman from Pretoria has been accused of swindling more than a dozen wealthy businessmen out of millions of rands.
Kobus Boshoff, 51, is alleged to have used a network of front companies, bogus Black Economic Empowerment deals, identity theft, forgery and bank letters of intent - promising huge loans - to scam investors.
In total, they are believed to have suffered losses in excess of R41m.
The alleged victims include several doctors, Sasol director and KwaZulu-Natal Tourism boss Dr Seshi Chonco, and Abbey Makoe - a former SABC journalist and chairperson of the controversial Forum for Black Journalists.
Boshoff was finally arrested on Sunday night at OR Tambo International Airport through the extraordinary intervention of Chonco, who involved police from Kwazulu-Natal to effect a warrant issued late last year.
He appeared briefly in court on Monday and was remanded in custody pending further investigations. He is expected to launch a bail application next week.
Tangled web
A Beeld investigation has uncovered a tangled web of companies, dodgy deals and claims of police tardiness and corruption which have allegedly allowed Boshoff to operate virtually untouched for the past decade.
Boshoff is alleged to have used a Land Bank-owned farm worth R20m "as if it were his own" to wine, dine and charm his alleged victims without paying for it. He also rented a box at Loftus Versveld in Pretoria where he would entertain associates and prospective "business partners".
And, in an apparent bid to distance himself from some of the transactions, Boshoff allegedly used his gardener, Peter Nyembe, as a front, setting up a company and a Nedbank account in his name.
A Nedbank forensic audit completed last year found evidence of R4.8m in "confirmed fraudulent transactions" passing through the account at its branch in Montana, Pretoria.
A report compiled by bank investigator Frederick Swartz - a copy of which has been seen by Beeld - found that the transactions were "not of a nature which a gardener would have entered into" and that Nyembe's signatures on some of the cheques issued on the account "seem to have been forged".
Swartz further stated: "It ...is clear that Nyembe was not the person that was engaged in the underlying transactions but Kobus Boshoff."
A Nedbank Montana official, Sonja Smit, was sacked for "dishonesty" as a result of the transactions and could be criminally charged.
Arrested four times
Nick Jacobs, general manager of Nedbank's Group Risk Services division, confirmed that Smit was dismissed on September 11 last year, adding that the company had a "zero tolerance policy towards fraud and dishonesty".
Standard Bank spokesperson Ross Linstrom told Beeld the bank was also aware of Boshoff and was "investigating".
Between 1995 and 2007 he was the subject of at least nine fraud and theft investigations carried out by police in KwaZulu-Natal, the Free State and Gauteng. None of the cases ever went to trial. He was arrested four times but always released.
In September last year, DA MP Hendrik Schmidt wrote to Safety and Security Minister Charles Nqakula and National Police Commissioner Jackie Selebi listing 15 criminal cases allegedly involving Boshoff and noting that "despite all these cases, Mr Boshoff has still not been apprehended by the Saps nor has the police services acted on most, if any, of these cases".
Nothing came of the letter.