SA’s corruption emergency | Five years after the VBS Bank heist

Old Mutual Illness| Bernadette
My illness insurance was a great relief
THOHOYANDOU – News of the looting of the VBS Mutual Bank left a bitter taste in the mouths of many South Africans.
R2-billion disappeared in a cloud of corruption, leaving many of the most vulnerable even more destitute.
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VBS clients included municipalities while the bank’s retail depositors included stokvels and pensioners who were left penniless when the bank collapsed in 2018.
Advocate Terry Motau dubbed it ‘The Great Bank Heist’ when he released his report on the sorry affairs at VBS Mutual Bank.
Some of the bank’s senior managers made away with over R2-billion.
Established in 1982 by the Venda Homeland Government, the bank gained notoriety in 2016 when it gave a R7-million loan to then president Jacob Zuma after he’d been ordered to repay the state for upgrades to his Nkandla home.
Soon thereafter, reports about the bank being broke began to emerge when a number of customers claimed they hadn’t been able to withdraw their savings.
63-year-old Margaret Modau is one of the thousands of disappointed bank depositors, including local burial societies, stokvels and savings clubs.
Modau, a street vendor metres away from the bank, deposited money from her community stokvel each month.
She detailed the struggles of queuing for hours and sometimes overnight when news of the bank’s collapse broke.
Modau says she didn’t get all of the money deposited by the community stokvel.
For the Mango family its been a nightmare trying to collect their money over the past five years.
89-year-old Rembete Mango has been struggling to retrieve money from both his savings and investment accounts, with the total amounting to over R160 000.
He says he was disappointed during his last attempt as it’s clear he still had a long way to go before he’ll get his money.  
Mango says knowing that the money was stolen through corruption is sickening.
The 89-year-old says his family often complains and puts pressure on him to get the money as they continue to struggle financially
So far, 53 people have been implicated in the looting of the bank, including members of the ANC while the NPA nationally is seized with the majority of these matters, provincially, Limpopo officials are dealing with two cases.  
Over a dozen Limpopo municipalities irregularly invested money into VBS but the NPA is focused on two of them.
The Vhembe district invested over R300-million into the bank.
Municipal workers and unionists Ronald Mani and Timson Musetsho, were at the fore of exposing these irregular investments by municipalities.  
But their whistleblowing efforts came at the ultimate price.
Lucky Mani spoke about his brother, “I remember my late brother Ronnie, the same week that he was assassinated he also on a public radio station, he mentioned that we are against the decision to invest the money into VBS and our lives is in danger, we are aware.”
“He mentioned that he had reported that to the authorities that his life is in danger, they need to protect him. And the same week, maybe a day or two after the interview with the radio station, that’s when he met his untimely death.”
Timson Musetsho’s wife recalls the moment her husband was killed.
It was on the 24th of January 2019, while she was preparing supper in the kitchen
Musetsho would find his lifeless body further into the yard.
She recalled how just a day earlier her husband came back visibly shaken after a work meeting.
The two unionists were killed days apart and their families are still reeling in pain.
Three locals are facing murder charges.
The families hope the suspects will reveal who ordered the hits on their loved ones
Some political parties and civil society organisations are continuing to fight for the victims to be fully compensated for the money they lost in the heist.
VBS Liquidator, Anoosh Rooplal, says he’ll conclude his liquidation and distribution report by the end of this year.
He says he won’t be able to provide eNCA with an update until the report is finalised.