Vhavenda king Toni Mphephu has not yet addressed the nation in person over his involvement in the VBS saga.
On Monday he released an open letter where he admitted that he received gifts in the form of cash and resources worth R17.7 million from some people from VBS and Vele Investment.
He vowed to pay it back if given an opportunity to enter into an agreement on how to pay it back.
On Monday the media followed him to a resort outside Musina where he was meeting with other traditional leaders but still, they were not given an opportunity to interview him despite the fact that they were told to come to the venue.
On Monday the king’s office released an open letter not denying what Advocate Terry Motau wrote in his report that his majesty benefited from the loot from the bank.
The king drives around in luxury sedans and sometimes used to fly in a chopper allegedly given to him as gifts by some people from VBS and Vele Investment.
The king’s spokesperson Makondelele Mathivha says the king is sorry for what happened at the VBS and would like to pay back the money.
Just like what some people implicated in the report, his majesty too said he was not given a chance by advocate Terry Motau to give his side of the story.
“We are also saying that the king wanted to be invited by the advocate who prepared this report so that he could then give the side of his story as far as he knows. But be that as it may all we are saying is that the issue now is now we know that money was stolen from VBS and this money some of them and resources were given to his majesty as gifts, which they volunteered to his majesty.”
Meanwhile, retrenched workers at VBS Mutual Bank have accused the office of the curator of giving them incomplete retrenchment notices which lack some information about some benefits they will receive.
They were given the notices on Friday but they have not yet signed them citing dissatisfaction over the little severance package they are going to get.
Louise Brugman, of the office of the curator, says the only updated information is that some of them will qualify for the 13th cheque.
Monica Mukumela who worked at the bank for 15 years is an angry worker.
“I am not happy about the package. The curator did not treat this well. According to the package that we have because we only get one week of the completed year, and added by three weeks for which is very little because here at VBS we were earning less than R10 000. So if you may calculate it you might find that this is peanuts what we got compared to what we should have been given.”
Only 25 workers were retained to work at various VBS branches in Limpopo, Gauteng and KwaZulu-Natal.
Some of them left for greener pastures elsewhere while about a hundred were retrenched.
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