My sources also said that Mogoera had a falling-out with Magashule
not long after the latter came to power. ‘There was an exodus of people
in Mogoera and Mpambani’s circle to Gauteng because Ace had closed
their money taps,’ said one. FSHS records seem to support this claim.
In the 2008 / 09 and 2009 / 10 financial years, Sechaba Solutions earned
R 15 million from the housing department, but in 2010 / 11 its earnings
dwindled to a meagre R 56 000. After that, Sechaba Solutions did not
do business with the department again.^14 But according to my sources,
only Mogoera remained persona non grata. Magashule later welcomed
Mpambani back into his Free State fold.
According to a third source, Mpambani became close to Glen
Netshivhodza, the Parys businessman who is also one of Magashule’s
closest associates. As mentioned previously, Netshivhodza was
appointed chairperson of the Free State Tourism Authority in 2013.
The entity fell under the provincial Department of Economic Affairs
and Tourism, the same department Magashule had led under Lekota in
the mid- 1990 s. (It was later rebranded as the Department of Economic,
Small Business Development, Tourism and Environmental Affairs.)
Around the time of Netshivhodza’s appointment as chair of the tourism
authority, the entity began pouring substantial amounts of taxpayers’
money into Mpambani’s Beach on the Track parties. The authority,
which received between R 30 million and R 50 million from its parent
department each year, confirmed in its annual reports that the Beach on
the Track festival was one of the events it ‘successfully held and
supported’.^15 The reports do not specify how much the entity made
available to Beach on the Track, but one source familiar with the deal
says the tourism authority contributed about R 10 million annually.
The cooperation between Mpambani and Mogoera, meanwhile, came
nora
(Nora)
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