Science Fair Project Encyclopedia
Schabir Shaik
Schabir Shaik is a South African businessman from Durban, who rose to prominence due to his close association with South African Deputy President Jacob Zuma. He studied electrical engineering at M L Sultan Technikon and on May 28 1990 he was caught cheating in a High Voltage Engineering T5 exam and was barred for 12 months. It is alleged that he obtained a master's degree but no record of this was found at the technikon. He was an old friend of Jacob Zuma, who needed assistance with his finances after returning from political exile in Mozambique in 1990. Zuma had been elected Chairperson of the African National Congress (ANC), and Shaik helped him out financially, mostly in the form of interest-free loans with no date of repayment.
Along with former ANC treasurer-general Thomas Nkobi, Shaik established a company known as Nkobi Holdings. In 1994 he failed in an effort that would have seen Malaysian partners paying off the party’s huge 1994 R40-million overdraft. His brother Chippy Shaik was in charge of arms acquisition at the Department of Defence, thus allowing Shaik to bid on the lucrative corvette contract for the South African Navy.
Nkobi Holdings joined hands with the French company Thomson-CSF, and on 21 May 1996, Thomson Holdings, a South African company, tendered for the upgrading of Durban airport, a national ID card contract, the N3 and N4 road projects, the third cellular telephone network, and smart card technology.
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