While VBS “kingpin” Danny Msiza has been granted a separate trial from his co-accused for the brazen looting of R2.3 billion from the VBS bank, its victims continue to count their losses six years later.
Msiza, a former ANC treasurer in Limpopo, along with Limpopo colleague Kabelo Matsepe, must have been relieved after the Gauteng High Court, Pretoria, recently ruled the trial for the two would run separately.
However, prosecutor Hein van der Merwe indicated that the State would be appealing against the ruling, saying that all 13 accused must be tried together.
However, burial societies, stokvels, individuals, particularly the elderly, and municipalities continue to count their losses.
Speaking to The Star in a telephonic interview on Tuesday, Maria Tshigodime, 30, from Thohoyandou in Limpopo said her relationship with her mother and her friends had been strained after she convinced their stokvel to invest with the bank in 2017.
She said the women had asked her to handle the money because she was the youngest member of the social club, trusting her with R190 000.
She convinced the members to take out the money from a bank, known to The Star, to invest with VBS because it had good interest rates at the time.
“That was the day my life changed because I had made a very wrong decision that has pitted me against my mother and her friends who had invested in the stokvel.
“I took out R190 000, which was everything they had been investing and took it to VBS thinking I’d double their money in years to come.
“But at the beginning of 2018 when I was instructed to withdraw R20 000 for someone’s burial, the money did not come out,” she said.
She said despite half of the investment being paid back, her mother and friends had still not forgiven her six years later.
The scandal in 2018 witnessed victims braving the cold, lining up to withdraw their money after the news broke that the money was stolen.
Another victim, Sammy Ramunenyiwa, 67, from Louis Trichard said he found out that the R80 000 he had been saving for years had gone missing when he drove for an hour to Thohoyandou to withdraw it after he got an opportunity to start a food business.
“I had, along with my wife, decided to venture into an agricultural project that required me to get a small van.
“I identified the vehicle I wanted to buy but lost it after I visited the bank and was told my funds were not available …
“So I lost the opportunity because I could not provide the transport that was needed for me to get the business off the ground,” Ramunenyiwa said.
He said it had been a bleak couple of years because he and his wife were struggling to make ends meet because they were both unemployed.
It still remains to be seen when the trial will start.
The scandal, which could arguably be branded “The Great Bank Heist”, was exposed in 2018 by advocate Terry Motau, who was appointed to investigate it.
Motau penned a report afterwards that blew the lid off the scandal.
The bank was meant to benefit black people who were looking to borrow money to buy houses, and was started in 1982 by the Venda homeland government.
Its sole mandate was to help deserving residents of Venda buy houses.
Municipalities in Limpopo, North West and Gauteng had irregularly invested a combined amount of more than R1.6 billion. The money had presumably vanished into thin air.
The Star