Why bother asking Danny? How much of the $70 million did you get for being an accomplish in this sordid affair?
Business as fucking usual?
70 Million USD Case Involving a Cominiere Administrator: Antoinette N'samba in the Eye of the Storm
Last updated: 2024/07/11 at 5:40 PM
MinesPublished July 11, 2024
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The case of the alleged payment of 70 million US dollars (USD) involving the former Minister of Mines Antoinette N'samba Kalambayi, has caused much ink and saliva to flow. It raises fears of the opening of legal action.
Contents
Sword of Damocles ?Any questions to ask yourself?
Last May, the civil society organization Le Congo N'est pas à Vendre had raised the alarm, via a press release sent to Mines.cd, about a scandal involving the embezzlement of approximately 70 million USD and corruption involving the company Cominiere SA.
According to this civil society, it was an endowment that was allegedly made by the Chinese company Zijin Mining for the benefit of a non-governmental organization (NGO) Le Bouclier, headed by Jean-David É'ngazi who is also a member of the Board of Directors of this company in the State portfolio.
Since then, voices have been raised mainly on the web, calling on the former Minister of Mines, Antoinette N'saba Kalambay to clarify, rightly or wrongly, the "embezzlement of 70 million dollars involving an administrator of COMINIERE".
Sword of Damocles ?
The fear of a probable legal action is felt. The public wonders how a Chinese firm could pay such a colossal sum estimated at 70 million USD to an NGO belonging to one of the directors of Cominiere without the Minister of Mines knowing?
According to Danny Oleka, lawyer of Antoinette N'samba Kalambay, the Chinese company Zijin Mining would have made a simple "endowment" to the Congolese NGO of Jean-David É'ngazi. As a result, another opinion wonders why anti-corruption activists and journalists do not ask for clarifications from the Congolese NGO, nor from its leader, nor even from the company Cominiere but only from the former Minister of Mines.
Any questions to ask yourself?
For Danny Oleka, an analysis of this situation by an average intellectual with a minimum of common sense would have raised questions, especially if the fears of the authors of these publications were justified, would the ex-Minister have something to reproach herself for?
"Even if this donation had disguised dubious transactions, which cannot be said, the former Minister of Mines would not have been involved in the negotiations and/or transactions initiated or concluded by a public mining company, even on a mining right," he said.
The latter, being part of the State's assets, could not be the subject of a partnership without the State itself deciding, thus raising Article 8 of Law No. 08/010 of 7 July 2008 establishing the rules relating to the organisation and management of the State's portfolio and Article 1 B points 7 and 35 of the Ordinance establishing the attributions of the ministries which states that it was not up to the former Minister of Mines to engage the State-shareholder in such a process of disengagement within a portfolio company.
For him, the intervention of the Minister of Mines is technical, by the approval of the transfer, at the end of the instruction of the transfer application file by the services of the Ministry. Moreover, the question still arises, in light of the facts presented, of whether it is appropriate to speak of misappropriation of public funds.
For lawyer David Oleka, talking about misappropriation in the case of a donation until proven otherwise free and not noted by the parties, is to display one's ignorance in the public square, not being a judicial body. For him, there is no reason to seek clarification from Antoinette N'samba Kalambay.
For other analysts, this former head of Mines under the Sama 1 and 2 governments risks suffering the same fate as her former colleagues Nicolas Kazadi of Finance who took to his heels after the public outcry accusing him of embezzlement and François Rubota of Rural Development who is under provisional arrest warrant at the Kinshasa Penitentiary and Rehabilitation Center (CPRK, former Makala prison), both concerning the case of "overbilling for the drilling and streetlight project".
Faced with the accusations of some and the defense of others on the one hand, and the voices that are being raised demanding clarification from the former Minister of Mines on the other hand, it is up to the body of the Law to take up this case so that the truth comes out.