South Africa’s Atlantic Seaboard is known worldwide for its beauty and attractive real estate, but less well-known are some of the dodgy investors it is attracting. Using court documents, deeds office records and confidential source information, Open Secrets tracked R162 million in homes purchased by politically connected individuals from mainly Mozambique, DRC (Democratic Republic of Congo) and Equatorial Guinea. This comes at a time when SA is trying to remove itself from the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) grey list.
One of the reasons for SA’s sluggish compliance with the FATF requirements is the fact that about 40% of estate agents and 34% of lawyers failed to meet their reporting requirements in terms of the Financial Intelligence Centre Act (Fica). In 2023, Open Secrets and Platform to Protect Whistleblowers in Africa lodged a complaint with the National Prosecuting Authority (NPA) seeking a seizure and forfeiture order against properties believed to have been purchased with corrupt cash by relatives and associates of former DRC president Joseph Kabila. Open Secrets says SA authorities failed to follow up on the complaint despite the FATF’s pressure to improve money laundering.
Selemani and his wife, Aneth Lutale, often used aliases to conceal their identities, which was the ruse used to camouflage their ownership of properties in SA. “The biggest red flag indicating potential money laundering was the fact that Selemani and Lutale sold SA properties they own.