Nghixulifwa sentenced and fined N$150,000 for corruption – News

The crimes for which former Roads Contractor Company (RCC) chief executive Kelly Nghixulifwa was convicted were not aimed at personal enrichment, a Windhoek High Court judge said before sentencing Nghixulifwa to a fine of N$150,000 yesterday.

“On none of the counts did he personally benefit from his actions,” Judge Christie Liebenberg said during Nghixulifwa’s sentencing at the end of a lengthy trial.

Liebenberg sentenced Nghixulifwa (66) to pay a fine of N$150,000 or serve a three-year prison term on one count of fraud and three counts of corrupt use of his position as chief executive of state-owned RCC.

He also sentenced Nghixulifwa to two years’ imprisonment, suspended for a period of five years on condition that he is not convicted of any of the corrupt practices under Chapter 4 of the Anti-Corruption Act or of fraud, committed during the period of suspension.

Businessman Hafeni Nghinamwaami (59), who was tried alongside Nghixulifwa and found guilty of one count of fraud, was sentenced to pay a fine of N$30,000 or serve a one-year prison term.

Nghinamwaami was also sentenced to six months in prison, suspended for a period of three years, on condition that he pays N$30,000 to the RCC by 7 August and is not convicted of fraud committed during the suspension period.

Liebenberg sentenced Nghixulifwa and Nghinamwaami eight weeks ago.

The charges they were convicted of date back to 2004, 2005 and 2006, when RCC was involved in the B1 City development project in Windhoek and when a new headquarters for the state-owned company was being built in Windhoek.

Liebenberg found that Nghixulifwa used his position as CEO of RCC to benefit the company, /Ae //Gams Engineering, which was involved in the B1 City real estate development project in Windhoek.

In October 2005, Nghixulifwa authorised a payment of approximately N$4.5 million from RCC funds to purchase the land on which the B1 City development project was to be developed. The land was sold by the City of Windhoek and transferred to /Ae //Gams Engineering as the buyer.

Liebenberg also found that Nghixulifwa kept the RCC board in the dark about the use of RCC funds for the property transaction.

As regards the fraud charge for which Nghixulifwa was convicted, the judge found that he had misled the RCC board in late June 2006 by informing them that a mortgage bond worth around N$4.5 million had been registered in favour of the RCC, when in fact the registration of a mortgage bond was only completed in late 2006.

The judge also found that Nghixulifwa used his position as CEO of RCC to benefit Nghinamwaami’s company, Cradle Investment, by forcing it to pay about N$30,000 to an auditing firm that had done work for the company. Nghinamwaami was convicted of fraud in relation to that payment.

Nghixulifwa was also convicted of having used his position as chief executive of RCC in March 2006 to authorise a payment of about N$93,000 by RCC to settle arrears on a home loan account of a company employee. Nghixulifwa then repaid the money to RCC.

After being sentenced, Nghixulifwa, who is a mechanical engineer, told the court that he had spent around N$3.5 million in legal fees as a result of the charges he faced during the lengthy court proceedings.

He lost his property during the years the charges hung over his head, now lives in a rented apartment and still has to pay a N$600,000 legal bill, Nghixulifwa said.

He also said that the money RCC paid to purchase the land for the B1 City project was recovered by the company.

Although Nghixulifwa abused his position of trust at the RCC, the crimes for which he was convicted were not aimed at personal enrichment, Liebenberg said during the sentencing.

Defense attorneys Veiko Alexander and Trevor Brockerhoff represented Nghixulifwa and Nghinamwaami, respectively.

The State was represented by Hesekiel Iipinge.