12 Jun 2018

Gaborone Regional Magistrate - South, Mr Chris Gabanagae has finally relaxed bail conditions of the accused in the P250 million National Petroleum Fund (NPF) case, a move that has been welcomed by defence team.

Making his ruling in a fully packed court, Mr Gabanagae appreciated the complexity of the nature of investigations in the case as alluded to by the prosecution, but noted that the accused persons had been curtailed from crossing the border to conduct business for far too long, a move that might have prejudiced them in one way or the other.

The particulars of the offences are that Bakang Seretse of Khulaco (Pty) Ltd, Botho Leburu and Kenneth Kerekang are said to have on a date between September 5, 2017 and November 27, 2017 in Gaborone, acting jointly and with common purpose received, possessed, disguised and disposed P250 million knowing or suspecting or having reasonable grounds to know or suspect that the money was derived or realised in whole or in part, directly or indirectly from the commission of a confiscation offence.

Mr Gabanagae ordered that the accused be given their passports as and when they want to cross the border and return them upon their arrival home.

Magistrate Gabanagae further ordered the prosecution to return the property, chief among them the vehicles and computers of the accused as they were not procedurally seized.

Subsequent to that, he scheduled September 12 as mention date, where the prosecution is expected to update the court on its progress pertaining to investigations, which they said they had since extended to abroad.

In the meantime, the prosecution said it was not in a position to admit that when the court meets they would be ready with the taking of pleas, as they do not control the speed and the nature of investigations unless told by the investigators.

Earlier on, defence attorneys Mssrs Kgosietsile Ngakaagae and Dick Bayford had argued that it was taking unnecessarily too long for the prosecution to bring proper charges to the accused and conduct plea-taking because the prosecution rushed to court before investigating.

Seretse is managing director of Khulaco while Leburu is director of Khulaco.

On the other hand Kerekang is executive director of BERA.

 The accused are on a cash bail of P30 000 each, with each producing two sureties binding themselves with P10 000 each.

They are to report every fortnight at Gaborone West Police Station.

The prosecution is made up of Mssrs Wesson Manchwe, Tyron Mokgathong and Pascal Mandu from the Directorate of Public Prosecutions. ENDS