Image credit: Alexkor
News24 reports that the commission heard last Friday that a company that was appointed to market and sell diamonds for Alexkor had links to the Gupta family.
Former executive director of Gobodo Forensics, Albert Torres told the commission chaired by Deputy Chief Justice Raymond Zondo last Friday that Scarlet Sky Investments appeared to have been a shell company when it first submitted its expression of interest to take part in a tender to market and sell diamonds for Alexkor.
He said Scarlet Sky's appointment, in 2014, was agreed to and signed off by the former CEO of the joint venture, Mervyn Carstens, even though the procurement process was flawed.
The company was said not to have licence to sell rough diamonds but was awarded the contract.
Torres said that investigations showed that one of the directors for the company, Kubentheran Moodley, was linked to the Gupta family business associate Salim Essa.
Moodley, who was said to be an adviser to former Mineral Resources Minister Mosebenzi Zwane, also requested a court to interdict the Zondo Commission from accessing documentation and personal items belonging to him.
Scarlet Sky was 60% owned by a firm Moodley represented.
Mathew Nyaungwa, Editor in Chief of the African Bureau, Rough&Polished
