Van Rooyen blasts Fishrot gang amid Trustco troubles

“There was a barrage of laws and amendments inflicted upon unsuspecting legislators in parliament under the stewardship of the troika detained Sacky Shanghala, James Hatuikulipi and disgraced fugitive lawyer Maren de Klerk...”These were the words of Trustco owner Quinton van Rooyen as he fights N$306 million in alleged tax arrears in court.He cited, among others, the Banking Institutions Act, the Bank of Namibia Act, the Income Tax Act, the Value-Added Tax Act, the Namibia Revenue Agency Act, the Namibia National Reinsurance Corporation Act, the Diamond Act, the Marine Resources Act and the National Fishing Corporation of Namibia Act.“These pieces of legislation have certain common features, namely that [they] firstly provide administrators of the Acts and ministers with unfettered powers, without parliamentary oversight, and secondly, in many cases, [that they] created parallel structures to skim revenue and cash to a handful of beneficiaries,” he said in court papers.“These beneficiaries roam the corridors of high offices in Namibia.”Trustco Group Holdings is denying being in arrears with the Namibia Revenue Agency (NamRA) and claims that it was issued with certificates of good standing – despite the N$306 million debt.This follows a move by NamRA to have 42 of Trustco companies’ bank accounts frozen this week through a High Court order.Trying to ‘kill’ TrustcoHitting out at the agency, Van Rooyen accused NamRA of not acting in good faith and working with the Bank of Namibia (BoN) to “kill” Trustco.Trustco’s shares were recently suspended from trading on the Johannesburg Stock Exchange, while the BoN is seeking to liquidate its subsidiary company, Trustco Bank.South African Supreme Court of Appeal judge Sulet Potterill ordered that the company restate its financial statements, saying the financial results of a company need to reflect its true financial health.Debt disputed“It is unfortunate that NamRA abandoned the consultative relationship in this abrupt manner by seemingly acting in cahoots with the BoN to undermine Trustco. By proceeding in this manner, NamRA has now laid bare the root cause of the continuous public complaints and outcries about the unjust, poor and substandard tax collection, allocation and refunds in Namibia,” Van Rooyen said.He added that Trustco was owed tax credit but NamRA had reversed prior decisions on Trustco, claiming a tax arrears.According to him, NamRA recently owed Trustco tax credit amounting to N$136 million.In fact, he argued, the revenue agency issued certificates of good standing to Trustco on 1 September. However, on 3 October, NamRA “surprisingly and unilaterally” reversed its prior decisions and claimed that the group now owed N$306 million (including interest).Per Trustco’s calculation, if its tax credit had been correctly set off, its amount due to NamRA would be N$7.8 million as of 31 August, he said.Fishrot enablersVan Rooyen also took a jibe at corruption accused Shanghala, James Hatuikulipi, Esau and Maren de Klerk for the composition of laws he said enabled corrupt politicians to steal from state coffers.Shanghala, then chairperson of the Law Reform and Development Commission (LRDC), is said to have worked in cahoots with the fisheries minister Esau to enact the 2015 Marine Resources Act, which gave the latter overarching powers to dish out fishing quotas as he deemed fit.It was through that Act that Esau stripped several private fishing companies of their fishing quotas, leading to massive job losses. The quotas were handed to state-owned Fishcor, which then sold its quotas to Icelandic company Samherji, which - in return - allegedly paid the Namibian officials bribes worth millions of dollars.There is no evidence that the Fishrot accused were also enablers of the other Acts cited by Van Rooyen.

Van Rooyen blasts Fishrot gang amid Trustco troubles

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Namibian Sun 2025-09-23

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Van Rooyen blasts Fishrot gang amid Trustco troubles

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Namibian Sun 2025-09-23

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