According to documents that The Insider has obtained from the Australian Federal Court, Mugabe’s decision, which worsened his relations with the West and potential investors, enabled him to take the country’s silver away from a shady businessman who had confessed to smuggling precious minerals and at one time earned a living from helping dispossessed white farmers to externalise their wealth for hefty commissions of up to 25 percent.
Andrew Noel Cranswick, the chief executive officer of African Consolidated Resources, had even gone a step further to hit back at Mugabe. He had used the externalised funds to invest in his company. It is not clear if Mugabe knew then, but Zimbabweans, including the farmers that Mugabe had dispossessed, controlled almost 30 percent of ACR, the company that had been granted the mining rights to the Marange diamonds- dubbed the largest diamond find of the century.
Cranswick told Australian Tax Office (ATO) auditors that he had helped between 30 and 50 farmers to externalise their fortunes through an offshore registered company called Adonis Investments.
Though ACR was registered in Britain and was listed on the London Stock Exchange’s Alternative Investment Market, the brains behind the company, Cranswick and Ian Fisher, were both Zimbabwean by origin. Cranswick still owned a house in Greendale and was a Zimbabwean citizen travelling on a Zimbabwean passport while Fisher had moved to Australia where the two met. The only British director appeared to be Stuart Bottomley, a non-executive director.
Cranswick had his shares warehoused in Adonis Investments, which he later told Australian Tax Officials was a nominee company for “people with exchange problems in Zimbabwe, primarily” though it also did some business with people from Mozambique and South Africa.
He told ATO auditors in Perth on 15 April 2009, after they suspected that he was dodging taxes because he had applied for residence status in Australia but was not paying tax yet his only bank accounts were in Australia, that he used Adonis Investments for most of his business.
Cranswick was declared bankrupt after ATO assessed that he owed AU$1.1 million in taxes (about US$1 million).
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