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I thought I would post a thread on Du Wei to further highlight the corruption in the DRC. He is Simon Cong’s business partner and a close associate of Guy Loanda
Congo Hold-Up: Congo Construction Company, the scandal of the century© Sébastien Calvet / Mediapart with Michael J. Kavanagh
While the Forum on Sino-African Cooperation is being held in Dakar, Senegal, the leak of millions of banking documents and transactions to the BGFI reveals the secret history of what has been called in the Democratic Republic of Congo, the "contract of the century": a convention signed between China and the DRC that was to allow the largest Chinese companies to exploit a large deposit in this Central African country against The Congo Hold-up survey reveals the names of intermediaries and the millions of dollars paid. Investigation by The Sentry and Bloomberg, with Mediapart, PPLAAF and the European EIC network.
"The account was finally emptied. The head of internal audit of the BGFI group in Libreville, Yvon Douhore, does not believe his eyes. On July 5, 2018, a Chinese businessman has just left the headquarters of his subsidiary in Kinshasa, the capital of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) with 13,624 hundred dollars, 10,001 fifty bills and 43,000 small American notes, despite explicit instructions prohibiting these withdrawals. Total amount won in small and large denominations: More than $2.5 million. "I miss the words," replied one of his colleagues the next day.
The withdrawal slip. © PPLAAF / Mediapart
The businessman in question is called "David" Du Wei and his company, Congo Construction Company (CCC). A month earlier, Yvon Douhore had demanded from the management of the BGFIBank DRC a whole series of documents to authorize transactions on the accounts of this strange company. In the absence of adequate explanations, it is under his supervision that the accounts are blocked on June 19, 2018 by the compliance department of the Congolese subsidiary.
Douhore's colleagues blocked the accounts while the head of internal audit was investigating the embezzlement committed during the mandate of Francis Selemani Mtwale at the head of the BGFI DRC. President Kabila's adoptive brother has just left the bank leaving behind a series of scandals. But although he is no longer in office, someone at the BGFI in Kinshasa continues to authorize transactions on behalf of CCC, until the last cash withdrawal of $2.5 million in July 2018.
The millions of documents and bank transactions obtained by the Whistleblower Protection Platform (PPLAAF) and the French news site Mediapart suggest why: Douhore attended, helplessly, the final act of CCC's secret role as an intermediary between Chinese mining groups and the Kabila clan.
Congo Construction Company has construction only the name. Rather, this company and its founder, Du Wei, seem to have played a facilitating role in the negotiations around the execution of what was called the "contract of the century" under the regime of Joseph Kabila (2001-2019). Since 2008, the DRC and China have signed an agreement for loans of $6.2 billion. This historic agreement was presented as a "win-win" exchange of Congolese minerals against the construction by Chinese companies of infrastructure, mainly road, in the DRC. A joint venture was created under this agreement: the Sino-Congolese Mining (Sicomines). Gécamines, the Congolese state mining company and the two Chinese public behemoths, China Railway Group Ltd (CRCG) and Power Construction Corporation of China (Powerchina), through its foreign subsidiary Sinohydro, become the shareholders.
This contract of the century will turn into a fiasco of the century: 13 years after, in September 2021, under the terms of a first audit of this Sino-Congolese convention, the Initiative for the Transparency of Extractive Industries (EITI) concluded in its preliminary report that some of the terms of this contract constituted "an unprecedented prejudice in the history of Congo". The EITI points to the shortcomings of a feasibility study for mining deposits exploited by Chinese companies, the signing of an amendment on the distribution of profits that even the Ministry of Mines was unaware of, and delays in the realization of infrastructure.
► Also read: DRC: a damning report on Sicomines on the government table
The Congo Hold-up investigation today reveals CCC's role in the execution of this contract. It also reveals that about $65 million passed through CCC's accounts between January 2013 and July 2018, of which $41 million was withdrawn in cash.
At key moments of blockages in the implementation of this project, we can see that at least $30 million will be paid through this front company to the first circle of former President Joseph Kabila.
Part of these funds will pass through the account of the Office of Coordination and Monitoring of the Sino-Congolese Program (BCPSC) still led today by Moïse Ekanga, a close friend of the former Head of State.
For The Sentry, an anti-corruption NGO and partner in the Congo Hold-up investigation, this investigation "offers a rare and disturbing overview of a system of great corruption and state capture, as well as the international financial system on which it is based".
Contacted, former Head of State Joseph Kabila and his family members did not follow up. The leaders of the Sicominesno more.
In Congo, he calls himself David. He worked for Sicomines for three years until 2012, when he became a consultant for the BCPSC, according to his LinkedIn profile. It was also that year that he formed Congo Construction Company with Guy Loando, a Congolese lawyer then 29 years old, who is now Minister of Spatial Planning to the new President Félix Tshisekedi.
Guy Loando is not a stranger in the Chinese business community in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. His "mentor" and business partner, as he himself claims on his foundation's website, is none other than "Simon" Cong Maohuai, boss of the Hotel Fleuve Congo (which serves as CCC's headquarters) and the Congo's toll management company (SOPECO), which manages the juicy tolls of the former Katanga and Kongo Central. "Mr. Simon" is also Du Wei's friend.
Screenshot of the site of Guy Loando's foundation. ©
For ten years, "David" and "Simon" will be the main Chinese intermediaries between Chinese companies and Congolese officials.
A document obtained by our partner The Sentry shows that Guy Loando owns 20% of the shares in Congo Construction Company until July 25, 2017. But he is not, at first glance, among the main beneficiaries: Over the same period, he received from this company only about $22,000 in direct payments out of the 65 million that transited through this company's accounts.
Contacted, the Minister explains: "At the time, I was hired as a private lawyer to set up the company. His office would have "often served as a second shareholder", for companies with only one, when it was necessary to comply with the law.
Guy Loando assures in any case "having played no role in the day-to-day management of the CCC company", not having been "kept informed of his commercial activities" and also not being a member of his board of directors. He also specifies that he has "no knowledge of Mr. Du Wei's business relations in the DRC, China or elsewhere", or even "CCC's banking operations or any other transaction with third parties in the DRC or abroad".
At the very time of the creation of CCC, in 2012, the Sino-Congolese Convention is flaming. Congolese deputies dragged down the process of establishing tax exemptions for Sicomines, while the 2007 and 2008 agreements provided for them in black and white, officially to guarantee the long-term viability of the project. These delays lead China Exim Bank, the main financial partner of the project, to suspend its disbursements in 2012, after having already lent $1 billion to Sicomines. The case can be disastrous for Crec and Sinohydro who find themselves without external funding.
It is at this point that Du Wei comes into action. He opened an account in December 2012 for CCC at the BGFI. Even before any deposit is made there, millions of dollars are withdrawn in cash.
Between February and July 2013, this company, which had no known construction projects, received $18 million in bank accounts in China and Hong Kong held by four offshore companies registered in the British Virgin Islands, one of the most opaque tax havens in the world. Several of its companies, apparently unrelated, make their transfers on the same day, February 11 and July 9, the start and end dates in this large money transfer operation, as if these payments were coordinated. In Congo Hold-up documents, these transfers are labeled as "payment of construction costs", "other transfers" and "other".
The Kasumbalesa toll station, in the DRC. © RFI / Sonia Rolley
The last payment that feeds this CCC account is due on June 26, 2013 to the Road Management Company in Congo (SGR-Congo).
We sought to find out who was hiding behind this company that operates on the Lubumbashi-Kasumbalesa section, one of the most lucrative in Congo, because it is the main way out between the rich Katanga area and neighboring Zambia. According to the documents obtained by our partner, The Sentry, SGR-Congo had two Chinese shareholders: China Railway Group (Crec, 45%), which is also a shareholder in the Sicomines project, and its subsidiary China Railway Engineering Consultant Group (CEC, 15%). The third shareholder, a minority with 40% of the shares, is called Strategic Projects and Investments (SPI). The latter company is represented by the head of the Sino-Congolese Program Coordination Office, Moïse Ekanga.
SPI's statutes published in the columns of the official gazette published on August 15, 2006 tell us who actually controls the company: The brother of the former Head of State, Zoé Kabila and another member of the family unknown to the general public, are the main shareholders with 70% and 10% of the shares respectively. The third shareholder has since died. It was the gray eminence of Joseph Kabila, Augustin Katumba Mwanke.
Extract from the Official Journal of August 15, 2006. © The Sentry
In 2015, according to documents obtained by The Sentry, SPI became the only beneficiary of this toll, after the withdrawal of Chinese shareholders.
Between June 2013 and January 2016, this company made 41 transfers, worth $7.8 million, to CCC, almost all of which were withdrawn in cash.
The General Inspectorate of Finance (IGF) was interested in road tolls. According to this control institution, between 2010 and 2020, more than $700 million was embezzled by its companies SOPECO and SGR-Congo and the main person responsible would be Cong Maohuai. The IGM says it has not found any documents linking SGR to the family of the former president.
Contacted, "Mr. Simon" Cong Maohuai assures that since 2016, SGR-Congo belongs to him, without providing proof to the Congo Hold-up investigation. He denies any diversion. Zoé Kabila did not follow up.
Behind the scenes, his adopted brother and CEO of BGFIBank DRC, Francis Selemani Mtwale, recommends that a loan be granted to the organizing committee set up for the occasion. $65 million is requested by the credit committee on June 6, 2012. The file he establishes specifies "the reimbursement will be ensured by the retrocession of revenues from the contract of the Sino-Congolese program signed between the Chinese and Congolese States, managed by the Coordination and Monitoring Office of the Sino-Congolese program".
Discussions around the loan are the subject of a confidentiality agreement between the bank and the Congolese state. It was signed on June 14, 2012 by Francis Selemani Mtwale, on behalf of BGFIBank DRC, and the Minister Delegate to the Primature in charge of Finance, Patrice Kitebi. The parties agree on that day "that all information received on the occasion of the discussions and conclusions of the deed of credit opening referenced No. BGFIRDC/DEAJF/MBVE/001/06/2012 is confidential and may not be disclosed by one party without the consent of the other".
Two days later, the boss of the BGFI DRC justified it in an e-mail addressed to the headquarters in Libreville: "The State, insisting on the highly confidential nature of the said documents because of its ongoing program with the World Bank and the IMF, demanded the signing of a confidentiality agreement". At the time, the DRC was indeed under the program of the International Monetary Fund. But the IMF, any more than the World Bank, did not care about domestic debt at the time. The explanation therefore seems unconvincing. Contacted, former Minister Patrice Kitebi did not respond.
Why keep the secret? Perhaps because the organizing committee of this summit itself did not know that this loan was contracted. In any case, it is the version of the Congolese historian Isidore Ndaywel, general commissioner of the organizing committee. "I was not informed that the government had contracted a loan to BGFIBank," he explains, "however, we had been asked to open our accounts exclusively at this bank. ”
Finally, the loan granted is not 65 million, but 40 and it does not land on the account of the organizing committee, or even on the account of the Ministry of Finance. The $40 million is paid on September 25 to an internal BGFI account entitled "BBGFI Gabon USD Loan" and will be transformed into three loans granted by BGFIBank DRC.
The first two, for a total amount of $26 million, are granted to the Ministry of Finance, which transfers only $10 million on the account of the organizing committee of the Francophonie Summit.
On the eve of the summit, the remaining $14 million is sleeping on an account at BGFI.
A month later, on November 13, 2012, instead of repaying this overpayment that the Congolese government finally did not use in the parent company, the BGFIBank DRC transfers this amount in the form of a loan to the account of the Coordination and Monitoring Office of the Sino-Congolese Program (BCPSC). This account was opened for the occasion, four days earlier, by Moïse Ekanga. It is Francis Selemani himself who oversees this entire operation.
However, we will see that of this $14 million granted to the BCPSC, $7 million will be used to repay an informal loan granted to a company that Joseph Kabila is about to take control. This company is well known, it is Grands élevages du Bas-Congo (GEL) which still belongs for a few months to businessmen Alain Wan and Marc Piedboeuf, partners of the former president.
On September 25, 2012, while the Ministry of Finance obtained its first loan of $24 million for the organization of the Francophonie Summit, BGFIBank DRC granted a "credit advance", according to its wording, of just over $7 million to GEL. This operation seems to be an error and the transfer is presented to the GEL account as returned to the bank.
But this money will indeed benefit GEL. Instead of being returned to the BGFI, it is sent under a false wording to an account in Switzerland of HMIE, an offshore company registered in the British Virgin Islands, for a "purchase of agricultural equipment". HMIE belongs to the Belgian businessman Philippe de Moerloose, also very close to Joseph Kabila. When asked, he confirmed to us that it was indeed a sale of agricultural equipment.
In the end, the BGFI will get the refund of this $7 million. A transfer of the same amount is made by the BCPSC of Moïse Ekanga. The operation is called almost literally "REGUL CREDIT MIN FINANCES".
Moïse Ekanga's office does not just settle GEL's debt to the BGFI. Of the 14 million, the BCPSC transfers the remaining $6 million to MW Afritec, the construction company that also belongs to the Wan-Piedboeuf duo.
MW Afritec then transferred the money in multiple directions. It transfers $2.2 million to its other accounts, an additional $2.5 million to an account in Belgium held by an apparent subsidiary of MW Afritec which the Congo Hold-up consortium found did not exist in that country.
► Also read: Congo Hold-up: in the footsteps of Port de Fisher, Joseph Kabila's mysterious society
For the rest, half a million is withdrawn in cash and half a million is transferred to Carrières du Congo, a mining company from the same Wan-Piedbœuf network.
Contacted, Marc Piedboeuf and Alain Wan refused to answer most of our questions, judging our information "mostly false" and our approach motivated by the "manifest intention to harm". On November 3, even before the publication of this article, they filed a complaint in Kinshasa for "slanderous denunciation" against our partners Mediapart and De Standaard.
This is how the 13 of the 14 million lent to the BCPSC are spent thanks to the money officially planned for the Francophonie summit. The Congo Hold-Up investigation was unable to establish the destination of the last million.
But this money will have to be repaid. And Congo Construction Company will take care of it. Since February 2013, CCC's account has been funded by four offshore companies, created by a domiciliation firm already used in the past by the Chinese CREC group and whose accounts are based in China and Hong Kong. $18 million is paid in 5 months. This is more than enough to cover the loan from Moses Ekanga's office. Nearly 14 million will be withdrawn in cash. These funds are then returned to the BCPSC account and allow it to repay its loan to the BGFI.
This maneuver is barely hidden. On February 12, 2013, precisely $4.26 million was withdrawn from CCC's account, officially in the form of a cash withdrawal. They reappear the same day in the BCPSC account in the form of a cash deposit.
No ticket case circulates. The bank takes care of everything. That day, Moustapha Massudi, Commercial and Marketing Director of BGFIBank in the DRC, sent an email to Freddy Olela, Customer Relations Manager, asking him to withdraw this exact amount from CCC's account and credit it to the BCPSC. He copied Francis Selemani and Moreau Kaghoma, his chief of operations: "As discussed, please proceed with the
Illustration of the email sent by Mr. Massudi. © PPLAAF / Mediapart
Contacted, Moreau Kaghoma referred to BGFIBank. Freddy Olela did not answer. Moustapha Massudi says he does not remember this email, nor the transaction mentioned.
Where does the money received by CCC come from and behind the four offshore companies? We asked China Railway and the other Chinese shareholders of Sicomines if they had paid funds to CCC or if they owned companies based in the British Virgin Islands, they did not respond.
For a year, the Sino-Congolese joint venture has begun to produce. But in this year 2016, it is forced to reduce its objectives due to insufficient electricity supply on the site. The problem has been known for a long time and the solution is mentioned in the first phases of discussions between China and the DRC: it is to build a hydroelectric dam in Busanga. But decisions are slow to be made.
It will be noted that only a few days after an agreement was reached on the financing of the dam, Sicomines makes a first transfer to CCC's account of about $8 million.
Citibank in New York is processing this transaction. Its wording mentions "contract costs", even if there was no contract between these two companies.
On that day, CCC transfers about $7.5 million to Sud Oil, a company owned by Joseph Kabila's sister and sister-in-law, and the half a million remaining on accounts in the name of Du Wei in Hong Kong and New York.
A request for a transfer of about $7.5 million to Sud Oil.© PPLAAF / Mediapart
► Also read: Congo Hold-up: Sud Oil, the siphoner of Joseph Kabila's first circle
On August 29, 2016, a few days before the Chinese and Congolese stakeholders signed the final contract for the Busanga hydroelectric power plant, CCC received an additional $9 million from Sicomines, presented as a simple "payment". Here again, Citibank lets the transaction pass and the intermediary Du Wei takes its share, just under a million dollars.
Asked about these failures, the American bank explains that it "takes great care to ensure due diligence through internal controls" and "constantly work to manage and monitor" its operations "in order to comply with applicable laws and regulations".
Of these 9 million, 7 are paid this time into the account of the Zhengwei Technical Cooperation Company (SZTC), which had ensured the renovation of Kingakati, Joseph Kabila's private residence. SZTC also received $5 million from Sud Oil via Kwanza Capital, and at the time financed the construction of a commercial complex in Lubumbashi, Hypnose, whose ownership is attributed by the Lushe population to the former head of state. This complex shares the same address with SPI, the company founded by its brother, Zoé Kabila: 826 Mama Yemo Avenue in Lubumbashi. Joseph Kabila and Moïse Ekanga were present at its inauguration.
Contacted, SZTC says it does not know Mr. "Du Wei", his activities and does not have a commercial relationship with him.
View of the entrance to the Hypnosis building, in the DRC. © RFI / Sonia Rolley
Through an account with the Bank of China, Sicomines transferred an additional $8 million to CCC in September 2016.
Du Wei takes its commission and transfers about $2.6 million through various channels to the accounts of All Oceans Logistics (AOL), a company registered in the Faroe Islands, an archipelago located between Great Britain and Iceland, a real tax haven for shipowners. AOL owns at least one boat from the Egale fleet, a company also controlled by relatives of Joseph Kabila: the cold ship El Nino which the following year will transport wild animals to Nsele, Joseph Kabila's animal park. Contacted, its leaders did not follow up on our questions.
► Also read: Congo Hold-up: Egal, the autopsy of a scandal
Another transfer also attracts attention. A mysterious company, Congo Management (Coman), receives nearly half a million dollars from CCC. It is unknown to the general public in the DRC, but it is the main Congolese partner of Chinese companies in the construction of the Busanga hydroelectric dam with 15% of the shares. Coman has more shares in this project than the Société nationale d'électricité and no one knows the shareholders.
On the other hand, we know one of his representatives: Me Norbert Nkulu, Joseph Kabila's personal lawyer whom the former Head of State placed in the Constitutional Court. We also know its manager, Claudine Paony, Moïse Ekanga's assistant.
We went to Coman's headquarters in Lubumbashi. It is a private residence that serves only as a mailbox. Its owner assures that he is the founder of Coman, but has sold it for a long time. He refuses to say more. Contacted, Me Norbert Nkulu and Claudine Paony did not follow up.
Du Wei began restructuring his company in July 2017 and became its sole shareholder. It transfers all CCC shares to a company registered in the British Virgin Islands called Harefield Overseas Ltd.
Du Wei also takes over a phosphate operating license owned by Allamanda Trading Ltd, a company linked to the Kabila family. Its representative is none other than Alain Wan, partner of the former Head of State. Allamanda Trading's phosphate operating license borders the agricultural land of GEL, the company owned by Joseph Kabila and his children. Allamanda Trading is also a shareholder in several companies with GEL: Port de Fisher and a mining company called Carrières du Congo.
The phosphate deposit is located under the village of Kanzi, between Boma and Muanda, in the province of Kongo Central. Its inhabitants have seen companies, engineers in charge of prospecting, passing for 20 years. They were promised that one day they would benefit from this exploitation, but so far, they have not seen anything. Around them, the GEL farms have grown and their cows are walking everywhere.
Despite our insistent requests, none of the parties involved in this transaction answered our questions.
In January 2018, Chinese mining giant China Molybdenum Co. bought CCC and its phosphate license for $40 million and obtained this permit transfer in three days. China Moly recently landed in Congo by taking control of Tenke Fungurume's copper-cobalt mine (TFM) in transactions of more than $3 billion. In 2020, the Chinese company also paid $550 million to take control of another major Congolese deposit, the Kisanfu copper-cobalt project.
This takeover comes at a time when a new mining code is being adopted in the DRC. The Congolese State took the opportunity to renegotiate the largest mining contracts of the former Katanga province deemed unfavorable. While several companies agree to modify their contract, the agreement directly signed with TFM has remained unchanged.
Contacted on the underside of this transaction, China Moly explains that Du Wei would have learned of its interest in the phosphate deposit in 2017. She also assures that he was the sole shareholder of Harefield Overseas Ltd, the offshore vehicle that held CCC at the time of the transaction. As to whether China Moly will one day exploit the huge deposit of the village of Kanzi, the Chinese company says it will develop the project "at an appropriate time in the future".
amp.rfi.fr
Congo Hold-Up: Congo Construction Company, the scandal of the century
Published on: 11/28/2021 - 23:00Congo Hold-Up: Congo Construction Company, the scandal of the century© Sébastien Calvet / Mediapart with Michael J. Kavanagh
While the Forum on Sino-African Cooperation is being held in Dakar, Senegal, the leak of millions of banking documents and transactions to the BGFI reveals the secret history of what has been called in the Democratic Republic of Congo, the "contract of the century": a convention signed between China and the DRC that was to allow the largest Chinese companies to exploit a large deposit in this Central African country against The Congo Hold-up survey reveals the names of intermediaries and the millions of dollars paid. Investigation by The Sentry and Bloomberg, with Mediapart, PPLAAF and the European EIC network.
"The account was finally emptied. The head of internal audit of the BGFI group in Libreville, Yvon Douhore, does not believe his eyes. On July 5, 2018, a Chinese businessman has just left the headquarters of his subsidiary in Kinshasa, the capital of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) with 13,624 hundred dollars, 10,001 fifty bills and 43,000 small American notes, despite explicit instructions prohibiting these withdrawals. Total amount won in small and large denominations: More than $2.5 million. "I miss the words," replied one of his colleagues the next day.
The withdrawal slip. © PPLAAF / Mediapart
The businessman in question is called "David" Du Wei and his company, Congo Construction Company (CCC). A month earlier, Yvon Douhore had demanded from the management of the BGFIBank DRC a whole series of documents to authorize transactions on the accounts of this strange company. In the absence of adequate explanations, it is under his supervision that the accounts are blocked on June 19, 2018 by the compliance department of the Congolese subsidiary.
Douhore's colleagues blocked the accounts while the head of internal audit was investigating the embezzlement committed during the mandate of Francis Selemani Mtwale at the head of the BGFI DRC. President Kabila's adoptive brother has just left the bank leaving behind a series of scandals. But although he is no longer in office, someone at the BGFI in Kinshasa continues to authorize transactions on behalf of CCC, until the last cash withdrawal of $2.5 million in July 2018.
The millions of documents and bank transactions obtained by the Whistleblower Protection Platform (PPLAAF) and the French news site Mediapart suggest why: Douhore attended, helplessly, the final act of CCC's secret role as an intermediary between Chinese mining groups and the Kabila clan.
Congo Construction Company has construction only the name. Rather, this company and its founder, Du Wei, seem to have played a facilitating role in the negotiations around the execution of what was called the "contract of the century" under the regime of Joseph Kabila (2001-2019). Since 2008, the DRC and China have signed an agreement for loans of $6.2 billion. This historic agreement was presented as a "win-win" exchange of Congolese minerals against the construction by Chinese companies of infrastructure, mainly road, in the DRC. A joint venture was created under this agreement: the Sino-Congolese Mining (Sicomines). Gécamines, the Congolese state mining company and the two Chinese public behemoths, China Railway Group Ltd (CRCG) and Power Construction Corporation of China (Powerchina), through its foreign subsidiary Sinohydro, become the shareholders.
This contract of the century will turn into a fiasco of the century: 13 years after, in September 2021, under the terms of a first audit of this Sino-Congolese convention, the Initiative for the Transparency of Extractive Industries (EITI) concluded in its preliminary report that some of the terms of this contract constituted "an unprecedented prejudice in the history of Congo". The EITI points to the shortcomings of a feasibility study for mining deposits exploited by Chinese companies, the signing of an amendment on the distribution of profits that even the Ministry of Mines was unaware of, and delays in the realization of infrastructure.
► Also read: DRC: a damning report on Sicomines on the government table
The Congo Hold-up investigation today reveals CCC's role in the execution of this contract. It also reveals that about $65 million passed through CCC's accounts between January 2013 and July 2018, of which $41 million was withdrawn in cash.
At key moments of blockages in the implementation of this project, we can see that at least $30 million will be paid through this front company to the first circle of former President Joseph Kabila.
Part of these funds will pass through the account of the Office of Coordination and Monitoring of the Sino-Congolese Program (BCPSC) still led today by Moïse Ekanga, a close friend of the former Head of State.
For The Sentry, an anti-corruption NGO and partner in the Congo Hold-up investigation, this investigation "offers a rare and disturbing overview of a system of great corruption and state capture, as well as the international financial system on which it is based".
Contacted, former Head of State Joseph Kabila and his family members did not follow up. The leaders of the Sicominesno more.
Ingredient #1: Choosing well-established intermediaries
CCC's boss, Du Wei, was born in 1979 in Liaoning, in the industrial northeast of China. He began working in Africa in the early 2000s and, in August 2016, he wrote an article for the Institute of International Studies at Wuhan University deploring the tendency of Chinese companies to use "unscrupulous means" to win major projects.In Congo, he calls himself David. He worked for Sicomines for three years until 2012, when he became a consultant for the BCPSC, according to his LinkedIn profile. It was also that year that he formed Congo Construction Company with Guy Loando, a Congolese lawyer then 29 years old, who is now Minister of Spatial Planning to the new President Félix Tshisekedi.
Guy Loando is not a stranger in the Chinese business community in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. His "mentor" and business partner, as he himself claims on his foundation's website, is none other than "Simon" Cong Maohuai, boss of the Hotel Fleuve Congo (which serves as CCC's headquarters) and the Congo's toll management company (SOPECO), which manages the juicy tolls of the former Katanga and Kongo Central. "Mr. Simon" is also Du Wei's friend.
For ten years, "David" and "Simon" will be the main Chinese intermediaries between Chinese companies and Congolese officials.
A document obtained by our partner The Sentry shows that Guy Loando owns 20% of the shares in Congo Construction Company until July 25, 2017. But he is not, at first glance, among the main beneficiaries: Over the same period, he received from this company only about $22,000 in direct payments out of the 65 million that transited through this company's accounts.
Contacted, the Minister explains: "At the time, I was hired as a private lawyer to set up the company. His office would have "often served as a second shareholder", for companies with only one, when it was necessary to comply with the law.
Guy Loando assures in any case "having played no role in the day-to-day management of the CCC company", not having been "kept informed of his commercial activities" and also not being a member of his board of directors. He also specifies that he has "no knowledge of Mr. Du Wei's business relations in the DRC, China or elsewhere", or even "CCC's banking operations or any other transaction with third parties in the DRC or abroad".
At the very time of the creation of CCC, in 2012, the Sino-Congolese Convention is flaming. Congolese deputies dragged down the process of establishing tax exemptions for Sicomines, while the 2007 and 2008 agreements provided for them in black and white, officially to guarantee the long-term viability of the project. These delays lead China Exim Bank, the main financial partner of the project, to suspend its disbursements in 2012, after having already lent $1 billion to Sicomines. The case can be disastrous for Crec and Sinohydro who find themselves without external funding.
It is at this point that Du Wei comes into action. He opened an account in December 2012 for CCC at the BGFI. Even before any deposit is made there, millions of dollars are withdrawn in cash.
Between February and July 2013, this company, which had no known construction projects, received $18 million in bank accounts in China and Hong Kong held by four offshore companies registered in the British Virgin Islands, one of the most opaque tax havens in the world. Several of its companies, apparently unrelated, make their transfers on the same day, February 11 and July 9, the start and end dates in this large money transfer operation, as if these payments were coordinated. In Congo Hold-up documents, these transfers are labeled as "payment of construction costs", "other transfers" and "other".
The last payment that feeds this CCC account is due on June 26, 2013 to the Road Management Company in Congo (SGR-Congo).
We sought to find out who was hiding behind this company that operates on the Lubumbashi-Kasumbalesa section, one of the most lucrative in Congo, because it is the main way out between the rich Katanga area and neighboring Zambia. According to the documents obtained by our partner, The Sentry, SGR-Congo had two Chinese shareholders: China Railway Group (Crec, 45%), which is also a shareholder in the Sicomines project, and its subsidiary China Railway Engineering Consultant Group (CEC, 15%). The third shareholder, a minority with 40% of the shares, is called Strategic Projects and Investments (SPI). The latter company is represented by the head of the Sino-Congolese Program Coordination Office, Moïse Ekanga.
SPI's statutes published in the columns of the official gazette published on August 15, 2006 tell us who actually controls the company: The brother of the former Head of State, Zoé Kabila and another member of the family unknown to the general public, are the main shareholders with 70% and 10% of the shares respectively. The third shareholder has since died. It was the gray eminence of Joseph Kabila, Augustin Katumba Mwanke.
In 2015, according to documents obtained by The Sentry, SPI became the only beneficiary of this toll, after the withdrawal of Chinese shareholders.
Between June 2013 and January 2016, this company made 41 transfers, worth $7.8 million, to CCC, almost all of which were withdrawn in cash.
The General Inspectorate of Finance (IGF) was interested in road tolls. According to this control institution, between 2010 and 2020, more than $700 million was embezzled by its companies SOPECO and SGR-Congo and the main person responsible would be Cong Maohuai. The IGM says it has not found any documents linking SGR to the family of the former president.
Contacted, "Mr. Simon" Cong Maohuai assures that since 2016, SGR-Congo belongs to him, without providing proof to the Congo Hold-up investigation. He denies any diversion. Zoé Kabila did not follow up.
Ingredient #2: Find a respectable deposit
Congo Construction Company's first major operation was carried out under the cover of the Francophonie summit held in Kinshasa from October 12 to 14, 2012. After the criticism related to his re-election in 2011, Joseph Kabila decided to receive with great pomp.Behind the scenes, his adopted brother and CEO of BGFIBank DRC, Francis Selemani Mtwale, recommends that a loan be granted to the organizing committee set up for the occasion. $65 million is requested by the credit committee on June 6, 2012. The file he establishes specifies "the reimbursement will be ensured by the retrocession of revenues from the contract of the Sino-Congolese program signed between the Chinese and Congolese States, managed by the Coordination and Monitoring Office of the Sino-Congolese program".
Discussions around the loan are the subject of a confidentiality agreement between the bank and the Congolese state. It was signed on June 14, 2012 by Francis Selemani Mtwale, on behalf of BGFIBank DRC, and the Minister Delegate to the Primature in charge of Finance, Patrice Kitebi. The parties agree on that day "that all information received on the occasion of the discussions and conclusions of the deed of credit opening referenced No. BGFIRDC/DEAJF/MBVE/001/06/2012 is confidential and may not be disclosed by one party without the consent of the other".
Two days later, the boss of the BGFI DRC justified it in an e-mail addressed to the headquarters in Libreville: "The State, insisting on the highly confidential nature of the said documents because of its ongoing program with the World Bank and the IMF, demanded the signing of a confidentiality agreement". At the time, the DRC was indeed under the program of the International Monetary Fund. But the IMF, any more than the World Bank, did not care about domestic debt at the time. The explanation therefore seems unconvincing. Contacted, former Minister Patrice Kitebi did not respond.
Why keep the secret? Perhaps because the organizing committee of this summit itself did not know that this loan was contracted. In any case, it is the version of the Congolese historian Isidore Ndaywel, general commissioner of the organizing committee. "I was not informed that the government had contracted a loan to BGFIBank," he explains, "however, we had been asked to open our accounts exclusively at this bank. ”
Finally, the loan granted is not 65 million, but 40 and it does not land on the account of the organizing committee, or even on the account of the Ministry of Finance. The $40 million is paid on September 25 to an internal BGFI account entitled "BBGFI Gabon USD Loan" and will be transformed into three loans granted by BGFIBank DRC.
The first two, for a total amount of $26 million, are granted to the Ministry of Finance, which transfers only $10 million on the account of the organizing committee of the Francophonie Summit.
On the eve of the summit, the remaining $14 million is sleeping on an account at BGFI.
A month later, on November 13, 2012, instead of repaying this overpayment that the Congolese government finally did not use in the parent company, the BGFIBank DRC transfers this amount in the form of a loan to the account of the Coordination and Monitoring Office of the Sino-Congolese Program (BCPSC). This account was opened for the occasion, four days earlier, by Moïse Ekanga. It is Francis Selemani himself who oversees this entire operation.
Ingredient #3: identify the right beneficiaries
Did the Francophonie summit serve as an excuse for Francis Selemani, Joseph Kabila's adoptive brother, to make funds available to the coordination office headed by Moïse Ekanga, himself close to the former Head of State? When questioned, neither the BGFI group nor Francis Selemani and Moïse Ekanga answered our questions, despite our multiple reminders.However, we will see that of this $14 million granted to the BCPSC, $7 million will be used to repay an informal loan granted to a company that Joseph Kabila is about to take control. This company is well known, it is Grands élevages du Bas-Congo (GEL) which still belongs for a few months to businessmen Alain Wan and Marc Piedboeuf, partners of the former president.
On September 25, 2012, while the Ministry of Finance obtained its first loan of $24 million for the organization of the Francophonie Summit, BGFIBank DRC granted a "credit advance", according to its wording, of just over $7 million to GEL. This operation seems to be an error and the transfer is presented to the GEL account as returned to the bank.
But this money will indeed benefit GEL. Instead of being returned to the BGFI, it is sent under a false wording to an account in Switzerland of HMIE, an offshore company registered in the British Virgin Islands, for a "purchase of agricultural equipment". HMIE belongs to the Belgian businessman Philippe de Moerloose, also very close to Joseph Kabila. When asked, he confirmed to us that it was indeed a sale of agricultural equipment.
In the end, the BGFI will get the refund of this $7 million. A transfer of the same amount is made by the BCPSC of Moïse Ekanga. The operation is called almost literally "REGUL CREDIT MIN FINANCES".
Moïse Ekanga's office does not just settle GEL's debt to the BGFI. Of the 14 million, the BCPSC transfers the remaining $6 million to MW Afritec, the construction company that also belongs to the Wan-Piedboeuf duo.
MW Afritec then transferred the money in multiple directions. It transfers $2.2 million to its other accounts, an additional $2.5 million to an account in Belgium held by an apparent subsidiary of MW Afritec which the Congo Hold-up consortium found did not exist in that country.
► Also read: Congo Hold-up: in the footsteps of Port de Fisher, Joseph Kabila's mysterious society
For the rest, half a million is withdrawn in cash and half a million is transferred to Carrières du Congo, a mining company from the same Wan-Piedbœuf network.
Contacted, Marc Piedboeuf and Alain Wan refused to answer most of our questions, judging our information "mostly false" and our approach motivated by the "manifest intention to harm". On November 3, even before the publication of this article, they filed a complaint in Kinshasa for "slanderous denunciation" against our partners Mediapart and De Standaard.
This is how the 13 of the 14 million lent to the BCPSC are spent thanks to the money officially planned for the Francophonie summit. The Congo Hold-Up investigation was unable to establish the destination of the last million.
But this money will have to be repaid. And Congo Construction Company will take care of it. Since February 2013, CCC's account has been funded by four offshore companies, created by a domiciliation firm already used in the past by the Chinese CREC group and whose accounts are based in China and Hong Kong. $18 million is paid in 5 months. This is more than enough to cover the loan from Moses Ekanga's office. Nearly 14 million will be withdrawn in cash. These funds are then returned to the BCPSC account and allow it to repay its loan to the BGFI.
This maneuver is barely hidden. On February 12, 2013, precisely $4.26 million was withdrawn from CCC's account, officially in the form of a cash withdrawal. They reappear the same day in the BCPSC account in the form of a cash deposit.
No ticket case circulates. The bank takes care of everything. That day, Moustapha Massudi, Commercial and Marketing Director of BGFIBank in the DRC, sent an email to Freddy Olela, Customer Relations Manager, asking him to withdraw this exact amount from CCC's account and credit it to the BCPSC. He copied Francis Selemani and Moreau Kaghoma, his chief of operations: "As discussed, please proceed with the
Contacted, Moreau Kaghoma referred to BGFIBank. Freddy Olela did not answer. Moustapha Massudi says he does not remember this email, nor the transaction mentioned.
Where does the money received by CCC come from and behind the four offshore companies? We asked China Railway and the other Chinese shareholders of Sicomines if they had paid funds to CCC or if they owned companies based in the British Virgin Islands, they did not respond.
Ingredient #4: Set clear goals
Was Congo Construction Company used to pay bribes to Joseph Kabila's first circle? One operation in particular suggests it. Between June and September 2016, at a key point in its history, Sicomines made three major payments to CCC for a total amount of $25 million. Du Wei will distribute most of this money to companies and individuals linked to the former president's family.For a year, the Sino-Congolese joint venture has begun to produce. But in this year 2016, it is forced to reduce its objectives due to insufficient electricity supply on the site. The problem has been known for a long time and the solution is mentioned in the first phases of discussions between China and the DRC: it is to build a hydroelectric dam in Busanga. But decisions are slow to be made.
It will be noted that only a few days after an agreement was reached on the financing of the dam, Sicomines makes a first transfer to CCC's account of about $8 million.
Citibank in New York is processing this transaction. Its wording mentions "contract costs", even if there was no contract between these two companies.
On that day, CCC transfers about $7.5 million to Sud Oil, a company owned by Joseph Kabila's sister and sister-in-law, and the half a million remaining on accounts in the name of Du Wei in Hong Kong and New York.
► Also read: Congo Hold-up: Sud Oil, the siphoner of Joseph Kabila's first circle
On August 29, 2016, a few days before the Chinese and Congolese stakeholders signed the final contract for the Busanga hydroelectric power plant, CCC received an additional $9 million from Sicomines, presented as a simple "payment". Here again, Citibank lets the transaction pass and the intermediary Du Wei takes its share, just under a million dollars.
Asked about these failures, the American bank explains that it "takes great care to ensure due diligence through internal controls" and "constantly work to manage and monitor" its operations "in order to comply with applicable laws and regulations".
Of these 9 million, 7 are paid this time into the account of the Zhengwei Technical Cooperation Company (SZTC), which had ensured the renovation of Kingakati, Joseph Kabila's private residence. SZTC also received $5 million from Sud Oil via Kwanza Capital, and at the time financed the construction of a commercial complex in Lubumbashi, Hypnose, whose ownership is attributed by the Lushe population to the former head of state. This complex shares the same address with SPI, the company founded by its brother, Zoé Kabila: 826 Mama Yemo Avenue in Lubumbashi. Joseph Kabila and Moïse Ekanga were present at its inauguration.
Contacted, SZTC says it does not know Mr. "Du Wei", his activities and does not have a commercial relationship with him.
Through an account with the Bank of China, Sicomines transferred an additional $8 million to CCC in September 2016.
Du Wei takes its commission and transfers about $2.6 million through various channels to the accounts of All Oceans Logistics (AOL), a company registered in the Faroe Islands, an archipelago located between Great Britain and Iceland, a real tax haven for shipowners. AOL owns at least one boat from the Egale fleet, a company also controlled by relatives of Joseph Kabila: the cold ship El Nino which the following year will transport wild animals to Nsele, Joseph Kabila's animal park. Contacted, its leaders did not follow up on our questions.
► Also read: Congo Hold-up: Egal, the autopsy of a scandal
Another transfer also attracts attention. A mysterious company, Congo Management (Coman), receives nearly half a million dollars from CCC. It is unknown to the general public in the DRC, but it is the main Congolese partner of Chinese companies in the construction of the Busanga hydroelectric dam with 15% of the shares. Coman has more shares in this project than the Société nationale d'électricité and no one knows the shareholders.
On the other hand, we know one of his representatives: Me Norbert Nkulu, Joseph Kabila's personal lawyer whom the former Head of State placed in the Constitutional Court. We also know its manager, Claudine Paony, Moïse Ekanga's assistant.
We went to Coman's headquarters in Lubumbashi. It is a private residence that serves only as a mailbox. Its owner assures that he is the founder of Coman, but has sold it for a long time. He refuses to say more. Contacted, Me Norbert Nkulu and Claudine Paony did not follow up.
Ingredient #5: Know when to leave
At the end of its existence, CCC is still at the heart of a transaction involving a large Chinese group: the purchase of a phosphate deposit in the Kongo Central province by the mining giant China Molybdenum Co.Du Wei began restructuring his company in July 2017 and became its sole shareholder. It transfers all CCC shares to a company registered in the British Virgin Islands called Harefield Overseas Ltd.
Du Wei also takes over a phosphate operating license owned by Allamanda Trading Ltd, a company linked to the Kabila family. Its representative is none other than Alain Wan, partner of the former Head of State. Allamanda Trading's phosphate operating license borders the agricultural land of GEL, the company owned by Joseph Kabila and his children. Allamanda Trading is also a shareholder in several companies with GEL: Port de Fisher and a mining company called Carrières du Congo.
The phosphate deposit is located under the village of Kanzi, between Boma and Muanda, in the province of Kongo Central. Its inhabitants have seen companies, engineers in charge of prospecting, passing for 20 years. They were promised that one day they would benefit from this exploitation, but so far, they have not seen anything. Around them, the GEL farms have grown and their cows are walking everywhere.
Despite our insistent requests, none of the parties involved in this transaction answered our questions.
In January 2018, Chinese mining giant China Molybdenum Co. bought CCC and its phosphate license for $40 million and obtained this permit transfer in three days. China Moly recently landed in Congo by taking control of Tenke Fungurume's copper-cobalt mine (TFM) in transactions of more than $3 billion. In 2020, the Chinese company also paid $550 million to take control of another major Congolese deposit, the Kisanfu copper-cobalt project.
This takeover comes at a time when a new mining code is being adopted in the DRC. The Congolese State took the opportunity to renegotiate the largest mining contracts of the former Katanga province deemed unfavorable. While several companies agree to modify their contract, the agreement directly signed with TFM has remained unchanged.
Contacted on the underside of this transaction, China Moly explains that Du Wei would have learned of its interest in the phosphate deposit in 2017. She also assures that he was the sole shareholder of Harefield Overseas Ltd, the offshore vehicle that held CCC at the time of the transaction. As to whether China Moly will one day exploit the huge deposit of the village of Kanzi, the Chinese company says it will develop the project "at an appropriate time in the future".
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