South Africa’s ODM faces “criminal” action
October 22, 2015
By Chris Forrester
A disgruntled former shareholder in Johannesburg-based On Digital Media, and which traded as ‘TopTV’, has commenced a criminal case against some of ODM’s executives. Mergan Moodley is accusing the directors of deliberate fraud, and colluding to defraud the original ODM shareholders in order to enrich the new shareholders.
Those new shareholders include Chinese-backed StarTimes Communications.
Specifically his claim alleges that two valuations of Moodley’s 0.7 per cent stake in the pay-TV broadcasted valued his shareholding as being worth 15 million Rand, and that this was below market value.
The claim argues that: “[the respondents] wilfully proceeded to defraud me of my shares and the fair value thereof and have each benefited personally — directly or indirectly — by acquiring my shares at a substantially reduced value based on the misrepresentation of the true value of my shares”.