Staff Reporters
IT’S a story of greed and avarice typical of a Hollywood block-bluster.
The lives of 200 Basotho, who had each hoped for a career flourish in the much sought-after financial services sector, now lie in ruins.
But the author of their miseries – Motena Lishea – is living like a pampered queen with access to mansions, beautiful cars and splendid holidays.
Her lawyer, suddenly turned lover, then official fiancé, and soon to be husband – Tšenase Tšenase – can’t perhaps believe his luck. Having been hired to do legal work, he now finds himself not only swimming in largesse far more than regular lawyerly fees, but snoozing and smooching in his client’s bed as well.
As reported by the Lesotho Times last week, Ms Lishea’s greed, in trying to seize a multi-million company, Platinum Credit, she had been entrusted to manage on behalf of an international financial services conglomerate, Platcorp, has not only left the 200 workers jobless and destitute. It has cost hundreds more potential new jobs that would have been created had Platcorp proceeded with pouring M1 billion more on top of the M280 million it had already invested in the country. Not to mention the millions the state would have accrued in tax revenues.
Ms Lishea’s quest for self-aggrandisement has thus sadly stalled the futures of hundreds of her fellow citizens.
Mansion
New information obtained this week proves her avaricious appetite for the finer things in life. On top of the millions in cash she has taken from Platcorp to fund her lavish lifestyle, she has been erecting a multi-million mansion (pictured) which many of her now jobless victims can only see in their dreams.
The soon to be completed multi bedroomed mansion will have a lift to whisk her from her dining area to her bedroom. There would be absolutely nothing wrong with all that if she had earned her wealth. The problem is that all the money she has been lavishing on herself is not hers. It’s money that would have changed the lives of hundreds of Basotho if it had been used for its intended investment purposes.
In one of its major successes, the Directorate on Corruption and Economic Offences (DCEO) had since obtained court orders freezing Platinum Credit’s accounts and forestalling Ms Lishea from abusing company funds for now while the anti-graft body tries to unravel the extent of her alleged fraud and theft.
The flurry of litigation underway has not only cost jobs, it has paralysed Platcorp’s M280 million investment and all its other planned investments into Lesotho. The whole episode is also besmirching Lesotho as a viable investment destination.
Meanwhile, it emerged this week that Ms Lishea and her other directors actually served a bit of jail time for defying a court order to stop the pillaging of company funds. High Court Judge Moroke Mokhesi had found them in contempt of court for defying one of his orders in the labyrinth of cases underway and sentenced them to six month jail terms without the option of fines. After their conviction, Judge Mokhesi had given them an opportunity to redress their contemptuous actions but they didn’t force him to jail them for six months.
Whistleblowers
Three of the directors and a company secretary decided to become whistleblowers and expose Ms Lishea’s shenanigans immediately after they got out of prison, courtesy of a controversial judgment by Court of Appeal President Kananelo Mosito (More about that later).
Their affidavits expose the actions of a self-aggrandising and manipulative woman (Lishea) who tried to use other directors as mere stooges to advance her agenda. In the process, she even became reckless in her greed and covetousness, but still depriving Platcorp of millions meant for its micro-finance business.
The three whistleblowing directors are Nthati Khutlisi, Lindiwe Adontsi, Matseliso Petrus and the company secretary is lawyer, Khati Mahase. They have all since quit Credit Platinum, accusing Ms Lishea of crookedness and using them to feather her own nests.
They say they were brought into the company just to add up the numbers. A tier II financial services licence from the Central Bank of Lesotho (CBL) requires at least five directors. Ms Lishea had no plan to run the company properly with their involvement when she recruited them, they claim.
All the four had been exasperated by doing jail time for a contempt case they claim to have known nothing about. The contempt issue arose after Platcorp’s lawyer, Neil Frazer of Webber Newdigate Attorneys, had obtained an order compelling Ms Lishea and her fellow directors to work with Platcorp and enable it to safeguard its investments pending the resolution of the main dispute about shareholding in Platinum Credit. This was after Ms Lishea had cut off Platcorp representatives from co-administering the company’s bank accounts. Platcorp had gone back to court after that order was defied resulting in the six-month mandatory jail sentences for all the seven directors of Credit Platinum plus the company secretary, Adv Mahase.
Poodles
While Adv Mahase, Ms Khutlisi, Ms Adontsi and Ms Petrus decided to jump ship, the other remaining directors Ms Nthabiseng Nthako, Mpho Monyane, Liteboho Lishea (a relative of Ms Leshia) have remained loyal to Ms Leshia. They stand accused of remaining her poodles.
But they all tasted jail time – after Judge Mokhesi sentenced them to six months for contempt. They were bizarrely released by Court of Appeal President Mosito, who sat alone in court, as the appeal court was not in session. Judge Mosito released them from jail pending their appeal against the six-month sentences. After her release, Ms Lishea continued siphoning funds from the company as evidenced by bank statements which are part of court records.
On instructions from Platcorp, Webber Newdigate had written to Deputy Prime Minister and Justice and Law Minister, Nthomeng Majara, over their concerns about what had happened in the Court of Appeal. Nothing came out of that complaint. However, as previously reported, Judge Mosito eventually berated lawyers whom he accused of complaining about him to politicians instead of confronting him directly over their grievances.
Still, all the Platinum Credit officers caught up in Judge Mokhesi’s contempt judgment remain convicted criminals. They are only appealing the sentences and not the substantive contempt finding itself.
After doing the jail time Ms Khutlisi, Ms Adontsi and Ms Petrus as well as Advocate Mahase authored their whistleblowers affidavits. These partly assisted the DCEO in getting the search and seizure warrants used to freeze Platinum Credit’s bank accounts.
Spaza Shop
The whistleblower statements paint a picture of a financial services company that Ms Lishea ran like a spaza shop despite the money poured into it by a major international investor. Her sole interest appeared to have been pilfering money from Platcorp at the expense of the business. She did not want her fellow directors to know where the money was coming from.
Ms Adontsi, who was also the internal auditor, states in her affidavit that Ms Lishea had repeatedly lied to her about many things. Ms Lishea had never invested a penny in the company, but she claimed to own Platinum Credit. Yet all the money was coming from Platinum Credit. Ms Lishea was only there for the looting, Ms Adontsi states.
“Motena Lishea never provided any supporting documents of transactions that I queried particularly relating to large sums of cash withdrawals…and online transfers from the Postbank account between the period November 2022 and December 2022.
“She just postponed giving me the supporting documents and ended up never providing it (sic), or any information about the purpose or recipients of the money,” said Ms Adontsi. She said Ms Lishea’s conduct made her work as internal auditor impossible.
“It was my responsibility, as the internal auditor, (according to GAAP principles) to interrogate source documents and financial transactions and prepare management accounts, which I could not do if I was not provided with up to date, correct and original source documents, like invoices, receipts, bank statements etc.
“The attainment of these documents was not easy (sic) because Motena Lishea did not provide them and because, she was the only person who had access to Platinum Credit’s banking accounts.
“On this score, she was the only person who had the password to the online banking profiles and she received the OTP on her personal cell phone.”
Huge Withdrawals
Ms Adontsi said she had nonetheless noticed from bank statements that large rounded off amounts of M50 000 and M100 000 were being withdrawn in cash or paid online from the company’s Post Bank account for payments that did not have anything to do with the business. Ms Lishea was effectively just stealing the money. It was therefore not possible to do any reconciliation of Platinum Credit’s bank account, she argued.
“These large transactions and withdrawals are very suspicious because I noticed every time there was a transaction, a secret meeting would follow. In these secret meetings it was always Motena Lishea, Advocate Tšenase (the fiancee) and Thabang Lerata, the compliance manager.”
Advocate Tšenase had subsequently been favoured with an illegal sweetheart transaction of M1 million, shortly before the DCEO froze the accounts.
Ms Adontsi said she only got to know about the true facts when Platcorp started litigating to stop Ms Lishea’s fraud. Ms Lishea had then swung the story around to claim that it was Platcorp that wanted to make a “hostile takeover” of Platinum Credit. How a reputable international conglomerate with billions worth of investments in a dozen different countries would want to come all the way to Lesotho to do a “hostile takeover” of a private company was not explained.
Ms Adontsi states that Ms Lishea had tried to make more payments of M9 million to herself and the directors as “golden handshakes” or “golden parachutes”. Ms Lishea had said the directors would need the money to fight off Platcorp and as gratuity payments. The payments were nipped in the bud when Webber Newdigate rushed to court to interdict First National Bank Lesotho (FNBL) from affecting them.
Ms Khutlisi, in her whistleblower affidavit, said she was approached by Ms Lishea and offered a job as a finance manager at Platinum Credit and as another director. However, the very financial affairs that she was supposed to be in charge of were hidden from her.
“I was not able to do my job because source documents and source information regarding the disbursements and large transactions/cash withdrawals was not provided to me,” states Ms Khutlisi in her affidavit.
She had realised Ms Lishea’s shenanigans when she became aware of Platcorp’s court cases against her. Ms Lishea had misrepresented Platcorp’s huge investments into the company as her own.
Ms Khutlisi said at one stage she had queried a payment of M190 million from Platcorp. She said she had been asked to prepare financial statements that excluded this figure. She was uncomfortable about doing it. Such a huge amount could not simply be disappeared from a company’s financial statements as it would make them grossly misleading. Moreso because the money had indeed been received and used by Platinum Credit. Ms Khutlisi said Ms Lishea had unsatisfactory explained the money as an “unauthorised loan” from Platcorp. Ms Khutlisi said she had then smelt the stench of a big rat. Platcorp could not reasonably have release such a huge amount to an entity without authorisation, she reasoned.
Ms Lishea made many other irrational decisions when she wanted to buy the loyalty of staff. For instance, she hiked Ms Khutlisi’s salary from 8 000 to 30 000 monthly without any board decision nor any rational basis for it.
“We were fed lies….” said Ms Khutlisi of her relationship with Ms Lishea.
“In hindsight, I verily believe that the board of directors were used as a front by Motena Lishea, for her personal gain and agenda.”
Her actions had prejudiced Basotho who were now out of jobs, she said.
“Motena Lishea does not seek to empower the locals (Basotho)…. She was only using the locals. I verily believe that Platinum Credit has a future, however it will not have a future if Motena Lishea is responsible for the management of the company,” stated Ms Khutlisi.
The Future
Indeed, Platcorp would want to continue the business and invest M1 billion more and create hundreds of jobs. But only if authorities help resolve the current case and get Ms Lishea out of the way.
The third director, Ms Petrus, said she had no clue why Ms Lishea had approached her to be a director as she did not possess any experience in the financial services industry and she had never served as a director of a company before. She only latter realised that her appointment was a hoax. She had been hired to fulfil a quota. Ms Petrus said she got into trouble when Ms Lishea paid her a sum of M175 000 without any explanation. The payment had resulted in her account being frozen after Platinum Credit went under the spotlight at the banks. When she inquired about the payment, she had been told it was a “benefit”. She said she was happy when her account was unfrozen and the money taken away by the bank. She then realized she was being used in fraudulent schemes.
Advocate Mahase said he had been hired to perform the work of company secretary and to help stave off the “hostile takeover” of Platinum Credit by Platcorp. However, it became clear to him that he had been lied to about the true state of affairs of the business by Ms Lishea.
It became clear to him that money for the business was coming from Platcorp but it was being stolen, he stated.
“We were concerned about the disappearance of money and believed that someone was stealing the money….” He said he had suggested that the money be returned to Platcorp after Platinum Credit’s bank accounts were frozen but to no avail. He was also concerned about the non-compliance with court judgments that were being issued against Platinum Credit resulting in his and other directors’ jailing.
Ridiculed
Despite being a trained and qualified lawyer, Adv Mahase said he was ridiculed and frustrated from doing his work. He was also spurned when he wanted to understand the exact state of affairs at the company.
“It is my strong belief that there was a fear within her mind (Lishea) that, after applying my own mind on the facts, I would realise and discover the truth that the company (Platinum Credit) is a subsidiary or franchise of Platcorp and that the funds in the accounts frozen by an Order of Court belonged to Platcorp….
“I and other members of the Board were merely pawns used in the selfish scheme and intent of the CEO….,” submitted Adv Mahase.
While Ms Lishea has thus far lived a life of splendour using suspected proceeds of fraud. And while it is claimed in one of the affidavits that Ms Lishea had expressed confidence she would prevail in the end because Judge Mosito would “always rule in favour of locals than foreigners”, the 200 Basotho, whose lives she has ruined, remain hopeless. Ms Lishea also stands accused of boasting about her connections in several institutions including the central bank to help her win in the end. The DCEO thus far appears determined to stop her in her tracks. Their case is back in court on 7 August 2023.
As reported in the last edition of the Lesotho Times, Ms Lishea was entrusted to run Platinum Credit on Platcorp’s behalf after the latter bought into her small micro-finance company Wazzah to gain access to its financial services licence. When the time came for her to handover the shares in the company, which had been renamed Platinum Credit, and had begun using Platcorp’s logo and branding, she balked and decided that reneging on agreements and keeping the investment to herself would make her fabulously rich. Of course, with M280 million at stake, she would naturally become one of the richest Mosotho women, if not the richest.
But her greed and avarice has cost many Basotho dearly. Platcorp has halted investments into Lesotho until it gets justice. Platcorp says it wants to know why Post Bank let Ms Lishea continue withdrawing funds despite court orders forbidding that while other banks like Standard Bank and FNB Lesotho complied with the orders.
If justice is done and it recoups its stolen investments, Platcorp says it will return and reinvest in Lesotho. Only time will tell.
