| Wed 18 May 2005, 11:09 | | Tale of The Guardian and Harmony bosses' offshore |
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Tale of The Guardian and Harmony bosses` offshore funds
May 18, 2005
By Renée Bonorchis
British paper The Guardian yesterday published its third story alleging there was a network of offshore accounts that belong to Bernard Swanepoel and Ferdi Dippenaar, respectively Harmony`s chief executive and its marketing director.
The Guardian`s original story appeared in February.
In The Guardian`s second story, published at the end of April, it said: `Details about dozens of new offshore bank accounts apparently held by the head of the world`s sixth-largest gold mining company have been obtained by The Guardian.
`Around 28 accounts based as far afield as Jersey, the Isle of Man and the Bahamas are held either in the name of Bernard Swanepoel, the chief executive of Harmony Gold, or his colleague, marketing director Ferdinand Dippenaar.`
Yesterday, this number had grown to 74 accounts, with a possible further 14 accounts. The amount of money allegedly moved around was now £22 million (R260 million).
When the first story appeared, Swanepoel said it was a personal low point for him in the acrimonious fight between Harmony and Gold Fields after five months of hostile bid spin.
Swanepoel said he did not have these accounts, and that he had asked the Reserve Bank to investigate whether a fraud was being committed in his name.
Dippenaar yesterday also denied having offshore accounts.
`Clearly this is malicious, we don`t know who is behind this,` he said, adding that The Guardian had failed to provide any proof for its story.
All The Guardian appeared to have, Dippenaar said, were photocopies, which `are meaningless`.
The Guardian claims however that the `information obtained by The Guardian [is] from highly credible sources`.
The second story sets out a brief trail of amounts of £5 000 being transferred through at least four accounts.
A bemused Dippenaar said it was obvious that after the first story did not make much of a splash, the only thing to do was to expand the story and to include him. `The story is not worth the paper it`s printed on,` Dippenaar said.
The story is zombie-like in that it will not die, and critically it does not answer the `why` for these accounts.
The Guardian would have us believe that Swanepoel every now and then likes to move around the princely sum of £5 000.
Why would these men, who earn millions of rands and who are fighting the fight of their lives for control of Gold Fields while trying to turn around seven quarters of losses at Harmony`s mines, waste their time fiddle-faddling about with £5 000 transfers?
That said, however, The Guardian did say this had been going on for the past three years.
Are we supposed to be reading more into this bland trail of accounts? What is The Guardian trying to say without actually printing it?
And are we supposed to forget that this story pops up out of the woodwork coincidentally during a hostile bid. The Harmony executives are adamant that it is no coincidence that these claims have surfaced while Harmony is fighting for Gold Fields.
And it seems the Scorpions, who, The Guardian claims, are investigating this, could yesterday not say whether there was an active investigation. NS
