THE minister of agriculture, water and land reform and the Namibia Industrial Development Agency (Nida) are being sued by a company which wants to get their approval for a deal to buy the late businessman Aaron Mushimba’s shares in a firm involved in a green scheme irrigation project in the Kavango East region.
In a lawsuit filed at the Windhoek High Court last week, the company Serve Investments 84 is claiming the agriculture minister and Nida have ignored attempts to get their approval for the sale of Mushimba’s shareholding in the company Agricultural Professional Services (Agri-Pro), and that the court should now order them to approve the share sale.
Serve Investments is citing the minister, Nida and Mushimba’s widow, Adolphine Mushimba, who is the executor of his estate, among the respondents in the case.
Adolphine Mushimba was appointed as executor of her husband’s estate last year, after High Court judge Thomas Masuku ordered the removal of fugitive lawyer Marén de Klerk, who has been implicated in the Fishrot fishing quotas corruption scandal, as executor.
Aaron Mushimba, who died at the end of August 2014, in his will appointed De Klerk as executor of his estate.
Serve Investments is asking the court to declare that the agriculture minister and Nida are deemed to have consented to the transfer of the Mushimba estate’s shares in Agri-Pro to Serve Investments, or to direct the minister and Nida to consent to the sale of the shares to it.
In the alternative, Serve Investments wants the court to order the minister and Nida to consider whether they will give their consent for the sale of the shares in Agri-Pro, or to direct Adolphine Mushimba to apply to the minister and Nida to consent to the sale of the shares.
The company’s application was filed at the High Court on Wednesday last week. By yesterday, none of the respondents had given an indication yet whether they would be opposing the application.
In an affidavit filed at the court, Serve Investments’ managing director, Frederick de Klerk, says there is no reason why the minister should not consent to the transfer of the shares to to company, except to in effect dance to the tune called by one of Mushimba’s heirs, his son Frans Mushimba, who has been opposed to the transaction.
According to De Klerk, Frans Mushimba informed the company in a letter in April last year that he was no longer opposed to the sale of the shares, subject to him being allowed to acquire 5% of the shareholding in Agri-Pro for N$600 000.
De Klerk recounts that Agri-Pro, the minister of agriculture and Nida’s predecessor, the Namibia Development Corporation (NDC), in July 2014 concluded an agreement in terms of which Agri-Pro would lease about 1 000 hectares of land forming part of the Shitemo irrigation project next to the Okavango River, about 90 kilometres east of Rundu.
In terms of the agreement, shares in Agri-Pro may not be transferred to new shareholders without the prior approval or consent of the agriculture ministry and the NDC.
De Klerk also recounts that Marén de Klerk, in his capacity as executor of Mushimba’s estate, and Serve Investments in September 2018 agreed that the company would buy the Mushimba estate’s shareholding in Agri-Pro for N$12 million.
However, that transaction is subject to the consent of the agriculture minister and Nida, as successor of the NDC.
According to Frederick de Klerk, Serve Investments has been managing farming activities at Shitemo on behalf of Agri-Pro since December 2015 and has invested more than N$30 million in the irrigation project since then.
After the agreement to buy the Mushimba estate’s shareholding in Agri-Pro was signed, Marén de Klerk tried to get the agriculture minister’s consent for the transaction, but the attempts to get his approval were ignored and the only option which now remains is to ask the court to intervene, Serve Investments’ De Klerk says.
He has also informed the court that Serve Investments’ only shareholder is a South African company, Integrated African Agri-Holdings, which in turn is owned by the company Ancile Investment, registered in the Grand Cayman Islands. Ancile Investment is managed by an asset manager, Inoks Capital, which is registered in Switzerland.
