Africa-Press – Eswatini. Kareem Ashraff, the influential, powerful and politically connected SwaziPharm Director is now facing a high level multibillion investigation into alleged tax evasion, some of his bank accounts have been frozen.
Tax evasion is the illegal non-payment or underpayment of tax and, the investigation is conducted in terms of legislations governing tax administration in the country.
It has been disclosed that, Ashraff who attracted the attention of the Eswatini Revenue Service(ERS) has been evading tax by using his various companies including Union Papers(Pty) Ltd, ASD Medical, AvaPharm(Pty) Ltd, Lifespan Diagnostics, Union Construction and other shell companies to transfer millions from one company to another but, some of the monies were subsequently transferred to Mauritius and other countries where the SwaziPharm Director opened bank accounts.
A shell company is a registered but, non-operating business, it primarily exists on paper to conduct financial transactions and hold assets.
But an independent investigation conducted by this publication uncovered that, some of Kareem Ashraff’s alleged shell companies used in the alleged tax evasion chain, were found to be lacking a physical presence, employees and actual business operations with their physical addresses registered either at 146 Sheffield Road Industrial Site-Mbabane or the Matsapha Union Papers(Pty) Ltd premises.
When establishing some of these companies including Lifespan Diagnostics(Pty) Ltd previously known to be owned by businesswoman Zinhle Matsebula, Ashraff allegedly registered emaSwati as Directors just to cover-up but, the bank accounts belonging to these companies were allegedly controlled by him.
As a result, some of these companies would participate in Government tenders as if “they are different corporate entities yet they, directly or indirectly, belong to Ashraff”.
This placed the SwaziPharm Director at an advantage of grabbing almost all multibillion tenders particularly, within the Ministry of Health where his various companies were competing and engaging in alleged rampant corruption.
It is further alleged that, after receiving the billions from the eSwatini Government, the politically connected businessman of Indonesian origin, would then ‘play around’ with the figures, transferring some of the monies to his various local and international companies as if, the companies requested loans, supplied goods or provided some services in what appeared to be an act of money-laundering and a systematic way of increasing costs of running the businesses with an alleged intention to subsequently declare less taxable revenue.
The SwaziPharm Director declined to comment about the new high level tax evasion investigation but some of his bank accounts have been frozen pending investigation.
Ntobeko Dlamini, the Eswatini Revenue Service(ERS) Director-Marketing and Communications said, “the revenue institution has a non-disclosure” policy on issues involving clients tax information and therefore, cannot share details of the alleged investigation.
“Our position, as always, is guided by our confidentiality obligations. We appreciate your understanding of our need to maintain confidentiality in these matters,” said the ERS Director-Marketing and Communications.
SwaziPharm Director Kareem Ashraff stands accused of looting billions of public funds resulting in the shortage of drugs in public hospitals.
Source:Swaziland News
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