Filabusi Residents Demand Returns From Local Investment Company

Returns on an investment gone wrong...Filabusi residents cry foul.

BY VUSINDLU MAPHOSA | @The_CBNews | This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. | JUN 25, 2021

Residents who formed an investment company 26 years ago say they have not heard from the company directors for the past 13 years, now they are demanding the disposal of properties and share of the spoils.

FILABUSI (The Citizen Bulletin) — Filabusi Residents in Matabeleland South who formed the Insiza Investment Company, an empowerment project in 1995 say they have not benefited from their investment and fear that the directors might be benefiting alone in the investment.

They say they have not received any feedback on their investment and properties for the past 13 years despite their public limited company acquiring properties such as cars, tractors, chicken fowl runs now lying idle, cooking utensils, office equipment and houses all of which they have not benefited from since then.

However, the investment company directors have dismissed the claims that houses were part of Insiza Investment company properties, but belonged to the Development Trust of Insiza which accommodated the Investment Company.

A member of the Investment Company Sibongile Khumalo says members contributed a lot of money since the inception of the company in 1995 and some of the members were drawn from the United Kingdom and the United States of America but all their investments are in vain.

“We poured a lot of money and even took money from our own projects to invest in this company hoping to reap great returns, but up to now we got nothing from this.”
Sibongile Khumalo, a member of the Investment Company

“We suspect that the directors might be benefiting alone from our investment. We are asking for the sale of all properties and share the proceeds among members rather than for a few to eat our sweat.”

She says some of the members have since died without benefiting from their investments.

Another member who preferred anonymity says the directors are currently renting out the houses with tenants paying US$250 for a full house while members are not aware where the money goes.
 
“We invested a lot of money in this company and it stresses me to think that out of it I got nothing to date. There were cars and no one knows where they are now. We only see our former leaders prospering in businesses yet we have nothing to show for our investments,” she says.
 
A company shareholder, Jabisile Ncube, who is also a founding member of the Development Trust of Insiza confirms that members have concerns over the collapse of their company and a lack of feedback from directors on what happened to their investment.
 
He says the Insiza Investment Company was formed under the Development Trust to empower the business community and locals.

“The company worked before the economic collapse in 2008. After the collapse of the economy, the directors did not come back to report to us what happened.”
Jabisile Ncube, company shareholder

“The leaders must convene a meeting with members to make us understand what happened. There were properties such as cars, office equipment, fowl run, tractors, shares and cooking utensils. The Investment Company never bought or built houses. The two houses belonged to the Development Trust. I am a founder member of the Development Trust and when the trust donors stopped funding it, we called people in the community to form a company and the company never bought houses.”
 
Ncube says the trust accommodated the Investment company directors in its houses, that is why people assume they belong to the company. He says the trust bought the houses using donor funds from Norway which came through Insiza Rural District Council and the government after the trust had applied for funding.

“Those who contributed money to the company need to convene a meeting with directors to get information about the company's standing,” Ncube says.

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Company board chairman Ndumiso Mpofu was not reachable for comment, but one of the board of directors Matilda Mahaso says most of the properties the company had were rented from the council, but she cannot account for them as she left the area in 2009.
 
“What I know is that there were files and most of the properties were rented from the council. We were renting a restaurant and a bar. I do not remember us having cars and tractors, I will have to revisit the issue with those who remained there in Insiza because I left the place sometime in 2009,” Mahaso who is now District Development Coordinator for Nkayi says.
 
“The office equipment they are talking about is just a table, chair and a wooden file cabinet. The fowl run is there, if they want to revive the company they can simply come together and do so.”

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