Lawyer contradicts Mfa's evidence in botched property sale to Sri Lankan

The noose is finally tightening around former cabinet Minister Olifant Mfa after Tshedukani Elijah, the lawyer who facilitated his land transaction, contradicted the former Minister’s evidence on Tuesday when he took the stand at the Francistown High Court. One of the directors of Pizza House, Siva Sangarapillar has accused Mfa of swindling cash amounting to half a million in a botched property sales agreement which never materialised. Mfa, who lost his shine in politics after the ascendancy of President Ian Khama to the top office, is currently a specially elected councillor.

In his evidence, Mfa swore that he never touched a single Thebe from the alleged amount. However Elijah left him with an egg on the face when he took the stand and told the court that P200, 000 was disbursed to Mfa while P300, 000 remained in his trust account. Under pressure of cross examination from Sangarapillar’s attorney Goralentle Nthatsi, Elijah said that the money was disbursed according to Mfa’s instructions.

However, he said that the P500, 000 was intact in his trust fund account. With guns blazing, Nthatsi asked Elijah if he had at any point called Mfa’s wife to any of the meetings to which he said no. Elijah said that he did not think it was necessary and the issue somehow skipped his mind yet the plot bore the wife’s names. Elijah said that he still does not know if Mfa’s wife knows about the agreement or not to date.

The court also heard that Elijah knew Mfa personally. Taking the court through the events, Elijah said that sometimes in 2011 he prepared an agreement of sale for Mfa to sell his plot to House of Pizza. Details of the agreement were that P500, 000 was to be paid as sale price upon delivery of title deed and cancellation of all bonds over the said plot. However the attorney said at the time he was not in possession of the title deed.

“The title deed was with Capital Bank and there was a bond over it,” Elijah explained. He said the issue that Sangarapillar wanted to know at the time was the tenure of the plot and Mfa could not verify this neither could he explain the absence of the title deed. Elijah said that he then contacted a state agent from Willy Khathirima to confirm the tenure of the plot which he could not confirm upon being given the plot number. “I cannot remember if he said it was a freehold or a state,” Elijah told the court.

He said that after signing the agreement, a cheque for P500, 000 was delivered and cleared by the bank and deposited into his trust fund. “In a day or two we discovered the land was a state hold,” he said, adding that the property could not be transferred and there was a heated debate on whether to transfer the property to House of Pizza or his wife.“At some point he (Siva) considered it should be transferred to his maid,” Elijah said. He said that Sangarapillar later engaged BK Mmolawa whom he later dumped and engaged his current attorney from Dambe Attorneys.

Previously when Mfa took the stand he had nothing good to say about the Director of House of Pizza. He accused him of fronting and maintained he wasn’t going to sell state land to a foreigner when Batswana are suffering without land, something which was new to Elijah’s ears. Mfa further said that Botswana’s economy is owned by foreigners.Mboni Manyothani represents Mfa in this case. Francistown High Court Judge, Lot Moroka will give his verdict on the 22nd of February next year.