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Al Jazeera Documentary

WATCH: Uebert Angel’s lawyer dismisses ‘Gold Mafia’ documentary

Ambassador at Large Uebert Angel’s lawyer Professor Lovemore Madhuku has dismissed Al Jazeera’s “Gold Mafia” documentary claiming that everything aired by the four episode expose was done under a classified operation by Zimbabwe’s intelligence system. This follows the release of four episodes of Al Jazeera’s documentary which implicated high ranking Zanu-PF  officials as part of a clique notoriously known as “Gold Mafia” facilitating smuggling gold worth millions of dollars.

Apr 14, 2023 Read more

WATCH: Gold Mafia – Episode 4 – Have The King With You – Al Jazeera

The net is closing on one of South Africa’s most notorious money launderers. In the final episode, the Gold Mafia boss issues a threat to anyway who breaks the oath of omertà. “What do you think is going to happen?”

“They kill you, don’t they?” “Exactly,” he replies.

A member of the same gang is now in hiding and speaks to the I-Unit from a safe house. “They will come after me, that’s a given. If I stay [in South Africa], I will be dead by the time this [film] hits the first five minutes of play.”

Apr 14, 2023 Read more

Chinyoka on Tuesday: The abdication of responsibility (Al Jazeera Expose)

By Tinomudaishe Chinyoka

State newspapers did not even report on the issue until after a statement by the Ministry of Information that the documentary had come to the attention of government. By then, we had imbibed two episodes. After being silent for two weeks, their first report is about government taking action over something that has been rambling along and that they pretended was not happening? I wonder what their readers thought.

We hear that Macmillan has fled the country, clearly some people let him leave. We hear that the RBZ is freezing bank accounts, despite the obvious stupidity in that action given that the culprits are not likely to have brought their money into our nostro system: in fact the whole premise of their criminal enterprise involves them taking money OUT of Zimbabwe not in, no? Freezing assets seems to be just the bare minimum we do while waiting for instructions from somewhere.

Apr 11, 2023 Read more

Swiss gold or smuggled Zimbabwean gold? No one knows

Kamlesh Pattni and Ewan Macmillan, who run two major rival gold-smuggling gangs out of Zimbabwe, both made clear to Al Jazeera reporters that they – and others in their field – had one preferred destination for the gold their couriers carry out of the Southern African nation: Dubai. Pattni and Alistair Mathias, Macmillan’s business partner, independently advised Al Jazeera reporters to set up front companies in Dubai. Once the gold from Zimbabwe arrives in the Emirati city, they said, it is melted in refineries there and rebranded as Dubai gold. Dubai is the UAE’s gold hub.

Apr 07, 2023 Read more

Govt accused of targeting small fish in alleged Gold Mafia assets freeze

The Government of Zimbabwe has been slammed for ‘conveniently’ leaving out the ‘bigwigs’ like Ewan Macmillan, Simon Rudland, Kamlesh Pattni, Uebert Angel and Henrietta Rushwaya exposed in the “gold mafia” documentary by Al Jazeera while freezing assets of the “small fish” who admitted facilitating smuggling of the precious mineral.

Apr 06, 2023 Read more

Al Jazeera exposes porous security systems at Robert Mugabe Airport

The second episode of Al Jazeera’s four-part investigative documentary has laid bare the porous Robert Mugabe International Airport and how security is intentionally compromised to facilitate the smuggling of valuable minerals and cash. Civil Aviation Authority of Zimbabwe head of security Cleopas Chidodo reveals in detail how criminal gangs can smuggle minerals and money through the airport, without repercussion – thanks to his facilitation.

Apr 03, 2023 Read more

Zim opposition parties demand probe into Al Jazeera gold mafia findings

Opposition parties in Zimbabwe are demanding a forensic investigation into the findings of the ‘gold mafia’ exposé by Al Jazeera. This follows an Al Jazeera documentary which implicated high ranking Zanu PF officials as part of a clique notoriously known as the “Gold Mafia” facilitating the smuggling of gold worth millions of dollars.

Mar 31, 2023 Read more

Who are the Gold Mafia? A cigarette don and a man named ‘Dollars’

They operate from the shadows. Al Jazeera’s latest investigation, The Gold Mafia, brings their crimes out into the open. Last week, Part 1 of ‘Who are the Gold Mafia?‘ dove into the lives of some of Southern Africa’s biggest money launderers and smugglers, from pastors to diplomats. Now, in Part 2, meet one of the region’s biggest cigarette moguls, a showoff money launderer and their crafty partners who are plundering their nations of money and gold using a web of highly-placed connections, front companies and carefully doctored documents.

Mar 30, 2023 Read more

Episode 2: Smoke & Mirrors: How Zimbabwe uses gold smuggling to evade sanctions choke

Zimbabwe’s government is using smuggling gangs to sell gold worth hundreds of millions of dollars, skirting some of the consequences of tough Western sanctions imposed on the country over human rights abuses, Al Jazeera’s Investigative Unit (I-Unit) can reveal. The smuggling feeds into an enormous money-laundering operation, all facilitated by Fidelity Gold Refinery, a subsidiary of Zimbabwe’s central bank, and enabled, in some cases, directly by senior government officials and relatives of the country’s president, Emmerson Mnangagwa.

Mar 30, 2023 Read more