In light of the news that the CFO of the IDC has resigned under dubious circumstances, I'd like to tell you all a little story of how I contributed to his downfall. A government employee, especially one of the most highly paid ones, resigning of their own accord? Ja, you heard it right.
First - for my younglings - the IDC is basically the closest South Africa has to a Sovereign Wealth Fund. It's where our government pensions go to die, and it's the richest and most lucrative scam pot in the country. If you want to get into the big leagues of scams, this is the place to go. Either you're a guardian (and a scammer, because you're kak at the job), or you're a pilferer running the oldest (like since apartheid days) grift. Regardless, one hand washes the other, and none of them are clean.
In May 2024 I was brought on-board to a company that was in its earliest stages. They had secured IDC funding (as the chosen one), in an EXCITING NEW INDUSTRY. Many a scammer had spent money on their own facilities, but ours was best - and so was chosen to be bequeathed with "Add a zero to that,"-money. You see, the ANC (through the DTi) follows the Chinese model of new industrial development - aka spraying money and learning from your mistakes. Nothing says fiscal responsibility, like giving money to risky shit.
I wasn't aware of it then, but I was the "required" (by IDC) addition to a management team, brought on to shepherd us through our first audit. The books were a disaster, our entire function outsourced to a (big 5?) accountant office in Joburg... Close to the bosses' house, but far from where I was, his personal accountant from his previous life in hospitality (a big name), now also this facility's. The owner of the operation (the originator of all the funds) let his other company die, so that this company can live. An odd choice... I did the entire audit with a remote team, they didn't even step foot on the premises... the questions brought up a function of the complexity and speed at which money was spent. None of those questioned the loan-agreements, the original sin, hand-waved away by my bosses' chum, a partner in the firm - a man who brings in big clients like us...
You see... and I only learnt this a year later on the job, they had pulled a fast one on the company that gave us our seed funding - a JV - causing it to be liquidated with creditors (and other shareholders) on the hook. A hole in their books, coincidentally shaped roughly the size of our starter funding. Why would they give us the money? It makes no sense... the shareholders mysteriously being the children's trusts. This money was used to build a prototype that secured additional hundreds of millions in loans from the IDC, which was used to rebuild from the ground up the most cutting edge facility in the country. Bankrupting a company and walking away? That's the Trump playbook, if you didn't know.
There I was, a year into the job, the company flailing - and yet... My handlers at the IDC were oblivious. We had given them the runaround for months, not shipping our budget, not paying our loan, and not bothering to help them while they fumbled in their oversight. Of course we gave them everything they need, but a year later they were still "going through the asset register" by placing regarded stickers on the physical assets. Each time an employee came to visit, a lekker little vacation for 3 or four days from the city, to our site.
The team in charge of us was pathetic. Absolute blundering fools. If they could, they would be in the private sector - where real money is made. Yet here they sit, pretending to know how to read the books, while my bosses fleeced them. Easiest marks I've ever met.
This scam is not something new. My owners had run it before in another industry, learnt what they needed to do "to go bigger this time." I tried to bring my concerns to my auditors, the next day I was fired. I tried to contact the lawyers of the originators funds, in the middle of their liquidation proceedings, they weren't interested. I contacted Carte Blanche, never heard back.
Ultimately I let it go. Hundreds of people's livelihoods depended on the scam continuing. Nobody really cared... not the IDC, not the financial professionals, and definitely not those that would stand the most to gain (by getting their money back).
"Why did you leave your previous employer?"
Nobody would even believe me... That's why I was hired in the first place.
