The Sudanese businessman embroiled in the Farmgate scandal is currently cooperating with the South African authorities – and would be willing to testify in any legal proceedings.
Hazim Mustafa said he would testify to shed light on his $580,000 cash purchase of 20 buffalos from President Cyril Ramaphosa’s Phala Phala game farm in December 2019.
On Tuesday, South Africa’s parliament will vote on whether to launch impeachment proceedings against Mr Ramaphosa in the wake of the Farmgate scandal.
in an exclusive interview with Sky News, Mr Mustafa said from his home in Dubai: “Anything to help justice and to show the truth. I have nothing to hide.”
Scanned customs documents mark his arrival in Johannesburg’s OR Tambo International airport and declaration of $600,000 in cash on 23 December 2019.
He said the original documents are with the South African police and asked us not to film or photograph the copies that were stapled to an affidavit.
In an independent inquiry launched by the parliament in August, Mr Ramaphosa identified Hazim Mustafa as the source of more than half a million dollars in cash stolen from the couch pillows of his farm in February 2020.
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The theft and stash of cash did not come to light until June when corruption and money laundering charges were filed by the president’s political rival and former spy chief, Arthur Fraser, who claimed an undeclared theft of $4m from the farm.
Though Mr Mustafa is cooperating, he is still baffled by the uproar and allegations of corruption.
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He said: “When we hear there is a money laundering scandal, we are hearing big numbers like $500m.
“It is huge amounts to be cleaned or washed and not usually the big names involved.”
Mr Mustafa said he brought in the money with the intention to buy a house – but, failing that, turned his sights to buffalo breeding.
“It is a premium meat because it is free of cholesterol and the milk of buffalo is high in protein content,” said Mr Mustafa.
“I found people there who work in safaris and was asking where I can buy good buffalo and Ankole cattle – and then they said the best and the largest one is Phala Phala.”
President Ramaphosa is known for his buffalo and Ankole cattle breeding, but Mr Mustafa still insists he wasn’t aware the buffalo or the farm belonged to the president until it made headlines.
“When I heard the news, it was the first time I knew he was the owner,” he said.
“Because if you saw the [company] structure, it belongs to a trust and that, I think, belongs to his family.”
The registered owner of Phala Phala farm is the Tshivhase Trust – a family trust.
It is a violation of South African law for the sitting president to be engaged in private business.
In a written statement to the inquiry panel, Mr Ramaphosa clarifies that he has invested his family’s money in the farm but operates largely at a loss.
“To suggest that I undertake paid work on or through the farm is mistaken. I plainly do not,” he wrote.
This is the first real challenge to President Ramaphosa’s leadership – so close to the African National Congress’ leadership election conference, due to start this weekend.
“There are still active investigations on the matter, therefore it will not be helpful to be part of a public debate about any detail until those investigations are concluded,” President Ramaphosa’s spokesman Vincent Magwenya told Sky News, when approached for comment on Mr Mustafa’s interview.
Representatives of dozens of climate vulnerable islands and African nations have stormed out of high-stakes negotiations over a climate funding goal.
Patience is wearing thin and negotiations have boiled over at the COP29 climate talks in Azerbaijan, which were due to finish yesterday but are now well into overtime.
After two weeks of talks, the more than 190 countries gathered in the capital Baku are still trying to agree a new financial settlement to channel money to poorer countries to both curb and adapt to climate change.
Talks have now run well into overtime at COP29, but a deal now feels much more precarious.
The least developed countries like Mozambique and low-lying island nations like Samoa say their calls for a portion of the fund to be allocated to them have been ignored.
Samoa’s minister of natural resources and environment Toeolesulusulu Cedric Schuster is one of the representatives who walked out.
“We are here to negotiate but we have walked out… at the moment we don’t feel we are being heard in there,” he said on behalf of more than 40 small island and developing states, whose shorelines are being lost to rising sea levels.
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Shortly after he made a veiled threat of leaving COP29 altogether, saying: “We want nothing more than to continue to engage, but the process must be INCLUSIVE.
“If this cannot be the case, it becomes very difficult for us to continue our involvement here at COP29.”
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Evans Njewa, who chairs a group of more than 40 least developed countries, said the current deal is “unacceptable for us. We need to speak to other developing countries and decide what to do.”
The last official draft on Friday pledged $250bn a year annually by 2035.
This is more than double the previous goal of $100bn set 15 years ago, but nowhere near the annual $1.3trn that experts say is needed.
Sky News understands some developed countries like the UK were this morning willing to bump up the goal to $300bn.
Developing countries are angry not just about the finance negotiations, but also on how to make progress on a pledge from last year to “transition away from fossil fuels”.
A group of oil and producing countries, spearheaded by Saudi Arabia, have tried to dilute that language, while the UK and island state are among those that have fought to keep it in.
Mr Schuster said all things being negotiated contain a “deplorable lack of substance”.
He added: “We need to see progress and follow up on the transition away from fossil fuels that we agreed last year. We have been asked to forget all about that at this COP, as though we are not in a critical decade and as though the 1.5C limit is not in peril.”
“We need to be shown the regard which our dire circumstances necessitate.”
This breaking news story is being updated and more details will be published shortly.
At least 11 people have been killed and 63 injured in an Israeli strike on central Beirut, Lebanese authorities have said.
Lebanon‘s health ministry said the death toll could rise as emergency workers dug through the rubble looking for survivors. DNA tests are being used to identify the victims, the ministry added.
State-run National News Agency (NNA) said the attack “completely destroyed” an eight-storey residential building in the Basta neighbourhood early on Saturday.
Footage broadcast by Lebanon’s Al Jadeed station also showed at least one destroyed building and several others badly damaged around it.
The Israeli military did not warn residents to evacuate before the attack – the fourth targeting the centre this week.
At least four bombs were dropped in the attack, security sources told Reuters news agency.
The blasts happened at about 4am (2am UK time).
A seperate drone strike in the southern port cuty of Tyre this morning killed one person and injured another, according to the NNA.
The blasts came after a day of bombardment of Beirut’s southern suburbs and Tyre. The Israeli military had issued evacuation notices prior to those strikes.
Israel has killed several Hezbollah leaders in air strikes on the capital’s southern suburbs.
Heavy fighting between Israel and Hezbollah is ongoing in southern Lebanon, as Israeli forces push deeper into the country since launching a major offensive in September.
US envoy Amos Hochstein was in the region this week to try to end more than 13 months of fighting between Israel and Hezbollah, ignited last October by the war in Gaza.
Mr Hochstein indicated progress had been made after meetings in Beirut on Tuesday and Wednesday, before going to meet Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and defence minister Israel Katz.
According to the Lebanese health ministry, Israel has killed more than 3,500 people in Lebanon and wounded more than 15,000.
It has displaced about 1.2 million people – a quarter of Lebanon’s population – while Israel says about 90 soldiers and nearly 50 civilians have been killed in northern Israel.
President Vladimir Putin has said Russia will ramp up the production of a new, hypersonic ballistic missile.
In a nationally-televised speech, Mr Putin said the intermediate-range Oreshnik missile was used in an attack on Ukrainian city Dnipro in retaliation for Ukraine’s use of US and British missiles capable of striking deeper into Russian territory.
Referring to the Oreshnik, the Russian president said: “No one in the world has such weapons.
“Sooner or later other leading countries will also get them. We are aware that they are under development.”
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He added: “We have this system now. And this is important.”
Detailing the missile’s alleged capabilities, Mr Putin claimed it is so powerful that using several fitted with conventional warheads in one attack could be as devastating as a strike with nuclear weapons.
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General Sergei Karakayev, head of Russia’s strategic missile forces, said the Oreshnik could reach targets across Europe and be fitted with either nuclear or conventional warheads – while Mr Putin alleged Western air defence systems will not be able to stop the missiles.
Mr Putin said of the Oreshnik: “There is no countermeasure to such a missile, no means of intercepting it, in the world today. And I will emphasise once again that we will continue testing this newest system. It is necessary to establish serial production.”
Testing the Oreshnik will happen “in combat, depending on the situation and the character of security threats created for Russia“, the president added, stating there is “a stockpile of such systems ready for use”.
NATO and Ukraine are expected to hold emergency talks on Tuesday.
Meanwhile Ukraine’s parliament cancelled a session as security was tightened following the strike on Dnipro, a central city with a population of around one million. No fatalities were reported.
EU leaders condemn Russia’s ‘heinous attacks’
Numerous EU leaders have addressed Russia’s escalation of the conflict with Poland’s Prime Minister Donald Tusk saying the war is “entering a decisive phase [and] taking on very dramatic dimensions”.
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Russia’s new missile – what does it mean?
Speaking in Kyiv, Czech foreign minister Jan Lipavsky called Moscow’s strike an “escalatory step and an attempt of the Russian dictator to scare the population of Ukraine and to scare the population of Europe”.
At a news conference, Mr Lipavsky gave his full support for delivering the additional air defence systems needed to protect Ukrainian civilians from the “heinous attacks”.