APLAUSE from the public gallery in the Windhoek Magistrates Court yesterday greeted a ruling in which bail was granted to all three members of the Teko Trading trio.Magistrate Gerrit van Pletzen gave his ruling in the bail application of Public Service Commissioner Teckla Lameck (48), her business partner, Kongo Mokaxwa (30), and Chinese national Yang Fan (39), immediately after hearing closing arguments from Raymond Heathcote and Sisa Namandje, representing the three and prosecutors Andrew Muvirimi and Lucius Matota.
The end result of the ruling was that Lameck and Mokaxwa were granted bail of N$50 000 each, while Yang will have to pay N$250 000.
The three suspects, who are charged in connection with a multimillion-dollar deal for the provision of Chinese-made X-ray scanning equipment to the Ministry of Finance that has so far already earned them a commission of over N$42 million, spent some five weeks in custody before being granted bail.
Yang would have to deposit an additional N$750 000 in bail money to lift an order freezing his assets in terms of the Prevention of Organised Crime Act, the Magistrate ordered.
He further ordered Lameck, Yang and Mokaxwa to report to the Anti-Corruption Commissions offices in Windhoek before 09h00 and after 16h00 every weekday and at the Windhoek Police Station at the same times over weekends, that their passports must be surrendered to the ACC, and that they may not travel out of Namibia while free on bail.
Having heard that Lameck, Yang and Mokaxwa had been granted bail, people in the packed public gallery in court gave a round of applause much to the displeasure of Magistrate Van Pletzen.
After the court had adjourned, people thronged around Lameck, Mokaxwa and Yang to congratulate them, with outspoken Swapo Party Youth League executive member Veikko Nekundi one of the first to embrace Lameck.
The Magistrate started by remarking that the matter reminded him of the tale of Don Quixote and his sidekick Sancho Panza and their attacks on windmills.
He said in his opinion the defence had placed before him all the evidence necessary to convince him that it would be advisable to grant bail to the three accused. Evidence that was tendered by the prosecution in turn also ended up being in favour of the case advanced by the defence, he added.
The Magistrate remarked that the Anti-Corruption Commissions chief of investigations and prosecutions, Nelius Becker, conceded in his testimony on Monday that the corruption charges against the three would collapse if it emerges that Lameck had the consent of the President to receive income from other sources while holding public office.
The prosecution told the court that the Public Service Commission Act states that a member of the Public Service Commission may not do any paid work outside the duties of his or her office as a Public Service Commissioner without the consent of the President.
Muvirimi argued that Lameck did not have such consent from the President. This means that the millions of dollars she was paid as a result of the X-ray scanner contract between the Finance Ministry and the Chinese manufacturer of the scanners, Nuctech Company, should be considered to be money earned unlawfully, which in turn would make her guilty of a corrupt act in terms of the Anti-Corruption Act, Muvirimi reasoned.
According to Lameck, she sent a letter to the President in which she informed him of her outside business interests. She told the court that this was simply the way that Public Service Commissioners and Ministers disclosed their outside interests to the President, and that the giving of explicit consent by the President was not the norm.
Heathcote argued that the Public Service Commission Act does not require the President must give his written consent to a Public Service Commissioner earning income from work beyond her official post. It can be inferred that the President had given his consent if he did not tell a Public Service Commissioner that she was not allowed to do other work after this had been disclosed to him, Heathcote argued.
Once that is accepted, the corruption case against Lameck and her co-accused would fall away, he said. Magistrate Van Pletzen appeared to accept this argument.
He also commented that in his opinion it is very dangerous to allow public officials to dabble in business with Government but as long as loopholes exist that allow this to be done, it would be used.
Lameck and Mokaxwa are the two sole members of Teko Trading CC, a close corporation that clinched a deal with Nuctech to supposedly act as the Chinese companys agent and consultant on the X-ray scanner contract with the Finance Ministry.
Lameck, Yang and Mokaxwa told the court this week that Yang, who is Nuctechs representative in southern Africa, is also employed by Teko Trading. For having been in contact with the Finance Ministry to ensure that the Ministry would make a prompt payment of US$12,828 million to Nuctech on the US$55,348 million deal between Nuctech and the Ministry, Yang earned Teko Trading a commission payment of a cool N$42,06 million in March this year, the court also heard.
Heathcote continued to justify this payment yesterday, telling the court: That is how it works in international trade. You agree on a commission as high or as low as you want.
The Namibian
Post published in: Economy