The Rot is Fishy

Karam Singh – Corruption Watch – Discussion on the Role played by Civil Society in fighting Corruption (30 min)

Karam Singh spent the last 10 years or so in senior management for various leading public organisations and a global philanthropy. Previously, he held a leading position with the South African Human Rights Commission with particular expertise in the area of socio-economic rights and most recently, led OSF-SA’s access to justice initiatives. His interests vary in the areas of anti-corruption, human rights, social justice and access to justice, though one of his over-riding passions is the issue of anti-corruption – this informed his Masters Degree (with distinction) in Constitutional and Administrative Law at the University of Pretoria in 2014. His formal training has been as an attorney both in the United States and South Africa, and he remains an admitted attorney in the state of New York and in South Africa.

Brigadier Narishka Sewpersadh – Discussion on the modus operandi on Fleet Card Fraud (30 min)

Brigadier Nashrika Sewpersadh is responsible for the management of the Integrated Criminal Justice System project for SAPS, event management of SAPS projects, crime intelligence analysis products, the administration of SAPS Education Trust and cryptocurrency currency case investigation. She served on the Cybercrime EU-SA project, is the cybersecurity advisory panellist at the CSIR and established the modus operandi strategic analysis centre (MOSAC).

Johannes Sefanneson – Discussion on the modus operandi of the Fishrot Scandal, how he whistle blew and the current status of the case (45 min)

Johannes Stefansson is the whistleblower who blew the whistle on a big corruption scandal known as Fishrot in 2019. The corruption scandal is about misuse of power by Ministers of Fisheries and Justice, officials and well connected business people in Namibia who received at least US$ 15million in bribes and kickbacks from the Icelandic fishing company Samherji in order for them to have preferable access to lucrative fishing quotas in Namibia for their own benefits and through bribery schemes, tax evasions and other financial crimes. Currently, Johannes holds a status of a suspect in Iceland but in Namibia he is a state witness and will go to Namibia to testify at the main trial which is expected to start during 2022 or 2023. Johannes has faced many life threating challenges, intimidations, propaganda, and other means against him since he left the fishing company Samherji in July 2016. Several attempts were made to his life including strongly suspected poisonings. Johannes received 2 awards during 2021, the The Order of the Baobab awarded by Ben Africa and the WIN WIN Gothenburg Sustainability Award 2021.

Devoshum Moodley (Chairperson ICFP Gauteng regional Committee)

Devoshum is a civil society activist, a multi-disciplined individual with an independent mind who is an out of the box thinker. She is regarded as an influencer of change. Devoshum is highly experienced with over 19 years’ experience in the internal auditing, external auditing, risk management, ethics and forensic investigations fields in both the public and private sectors. Devoshum is the ICFP Gauteng Regional Pretoria Chairperson. She held various positions such as Head of Forensic Investigations, Head of Risk Management, Head of Computer Audits, Chief Audit Executive and Head of Sector Audits, all at an executive levels. Academically and professionally, Devoshum obtained four qualifications and undergoing completion of her 5th qualification and achieved 5 professional certifications ranging from internal auditing, computer auditing , ethics , commercial law and forensic investigations. Devoshum is passionate about transforming the auditing, accounting, law and forensic investigations professions and an activist for holding professionals to account for unethical behaviour. Shr has been active in ensuring that ethics are advocated in the public sector. She is also a commercial labour law graduate and believe that her skill sets can add value to changing the landscape of whistleblowing and holding unethical professionals to account at large. She is not afraid to speak out especially in making a positive difference to society. Devoshum advocates for the protection and interests of whistleblowers.

Heidi van Staden (Member of the ICFP Gauteng Regional Committee)

Heidi started her career at Santam Limited in 1991 in a multi-functional environment and later specialized in claim negotiations being one of the 1st claims negotiators within Santam. Later she joined the Forensic department where she spends nearly 18 years of nearly 28 years at Santam as a Senior Forensic Investigator. In 2019 she joined Bidvest Bank as a Senior Financial Crime Specialist mainly focusing on staff, high profile, and organized crime related investigations. In 2022 she was promoted to Transactional Fraud Manager and besides managing the team she still attends to high profile and staff related matters. She concluded various training courses with HJN Training regarding investigation skills, attained her B-Tech Degree in Forensic Investigations thru UNISA and her Forensic Investigation Qualification through TUKS. She also recently received her National Certificate: Banking (NQF Level 5) She is a Certified Fraud Examiner (CFE) and a Commercial Fraud Practitioner (FP)SA. Her commitment in life is to support and assist to the best of her abilities the fight against crime.