By Zweli Martin Dlamini

NOKWANE:King Mswati has allegedly entered into business dealings with Albert Karaziwan, the Director of Semlex Group with a clear track record of engaging in corrupt passports manufacturing dealings in Asia and other African countries.

An investigation conducted by this Swaziland News uncovered that Albert Karaziwan, who launched his company on Wednesday, after the King officially allocated him land at the Royal Science and Technology Park-Nokwane, secures business and multimillion passports production tenders by capturing or bribing Heads of State and top influential Government officials.He then inflates the costs of the passports to cover the alleged bribes and generate more money.

The Royal Science Technology Park(RSTP) is under the site of King Mswati’s Special Economic Zone(SEZ) that is a subject of a high level investigation by the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists(ICIJ) on allegations suggesting that, it is a hub for shady business dealings, gold smuggling and money laundering.

Reuters,an international News Agency reported that on or around November 2015,the Semlex Director secured a tender at the Democratic Republic of Congo(DRC) to produce biometric passports by colluding with the then President Joseph Kabila.

It is alleged that, after the deal between businessman Albert Karaziwan and President Joseph Kabila as he then was, citizens of Congo were expected to pay $185.00(about R3,500.00) for each passport and as part of this business deal,President Joseph Kabila was to receive $60.00(about R1000.00) for each passport.

The deal between the Semlex Group Director and former President Joseph Kabila,when calculated with the DRC population suggests that, businessman Albert Karaziwan was targeting to generate over $1.8billion (about R34billion) and about R15billion was to be benefited by President Joseph Kabila.

It has been disclosed that,should Semlex Group be awarded a tender to supply passports, that would mean emaSwati will pay about three thousand five hundred Rands(R3,500.00) for each passport and this,depending on the alleged business agreement with Mswati,will also cover a share for the eSwatini King.

Mswati, directly and indirectly,allegedly holds shares in various giant companies in the telecommunications, agriculture, forestry, construction tourism and retail among others.

The passports deal,should Semlex use the same business strategy of inflated costs, would mean he might generate over R3.5billion from emaSwati.

Efforts to seek a comment from the investor proved unsuccessful at the time of compiling this report.

But King’s Spokesperson Percy Simelane, when responding to this Swaziland News on Thursday evening refuted reports suggesting that, the King is or was aware of Semlex Director’s alleged corrupt dealings.

“We have no reasons to believe the King has a list of international suspects.He obviously has been appraised only about the company and surely not about each administrator's skeletons in their cupboards.The allegation appears to be not part of the investment deal, but that of Europe and the African countries allegedly on the receiving end of the raw deal in question.Eswatini has no record or literature on the alleged crime and is not about to pretend it does”, said the King’s Spokesperson.

But an online investigation conducted by this publication further uncovered another report by Reuters suggesting that, the powerful and politically connected businessman “is listed on Comoros Government database as having three(3) current passports".

The database,according to the Reuters report suggest that, his Belgian wife, Catherine Laurent, was issued with a Comoros diplomatic passport in 2010, and that their twenty seven (27)-year-old son, Alexandre, who works for an IT consultancy in Brussels, also has one, some Semlex Group staff were also issued with passports.

The alleged highly corrupt powerful and politically connected businessman who was in eSwatini on Wednesday to launch his passport company.

Worth-noting the businessman is not a politician, a professional diplomat or a native of the Comoros but currently holds the three(3)Comoros diplomatic passports.

As a result,managed to attend the United Nations(UN) General Assembly using a questionable diplomatic status.

Albert Karaziwan was born in Syria in the northern Israel and is a citizen of Belgium, he managed to penetrate the passport supply market through corrupt means such that his company Semlex Group, has supplied and made passports for the Comoros government and over a dozen of other African nations.

On another note,King Mswati when cutting the sod marking the official launch of the Semlex Group project at the Special Economic Zone(SEZ) at Nokwane on Wednesday said, the establishment of a plant to produce passports in the country brings hope to the African continent.

“The setting up of a local plant for the production of secure identity documents brings hope to the African region for the localisation of highly specialised services which will further empower emaSwati on skills development, reduction of production costs for all secure identity documents.The advanced technology and rigorous security features embedded in these documents will ensure the integrity of our national identification systems, strengthen border control measures, and enhance the safety and protection of our citizens and residents”, said the King.