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Tycoon Wava’s Son in Ushs 500m Scam
Tycoon Elvis Sekyanzi in trouble
A spell is seemingly hovering over the family of tycoon Gordon Wavamunno.
Wavamunno senior is fighting to keep his business empire, including the Mercedes Benz franchise afloat that is said to be saddled by a total of Ushs20Bn in debt. His WBS TV station business has been taken over already by the Uganda Revenue Authority. The taxi people hold Wavamunno guilty of cutting taxes amounting to a total of Ushs7Bn.
The latest member of the Wava family facing it rough is Elvis Ssekyanzi. Elvis is one of the sons of Wavamunno senior. He is into the business of entertainment and events management. He is the majority shareholder in Silk discotheque based in Industrial area. He also holds a big stake in Silk Events, one of Uganda’s lucrative event management businesses.
Elvis’ instant problems seem to be self-inflicted. He invited trouble when he reportedly and cunningly at that made one of lawyers and city entrepreneur in Kampala to part with close to Ushs500m for shares that aren’t there.
John Masette is the lawyer who Elvis is reported to have taken on the proverbial wild goose chase. Masette practices law under Barenzi and Company Advocates. Elvis is said to have landed near to half-billion cash by simply telling Masette that he would sell him a 25 percent holding in the high-end Silk Liquid club. The club is located in Bugoloobi. It rents space at the Village Mall located right next to Shell Bugoloobi.
After checking with the registrar of companies and learning that the company by the names Liquid Silk does not exist anywhere in the company registry, the lawyer has turned to court to recover money he burned buying shares in a literally non-existent company.
Masette has lodged a lawsuit with the commercial section of the High Court, demanding that Elvis refunds his money with interest and extra money for breaching the contract he entered with him.
He wrote to the Uganda Registration Services Bureau in February this year asking about the status of Silk Liquid. The shocking response would come on February 17, 2016. We have the response. Its title is “Incorporation of Liquid Silk Bugoloobi. It is signed by William Brake on behalf of the Registrar General.
It reads and we quote: Your letter of reference 1/ Mash og//BA/2016 in respect to which we address you as under. That we wish to inform you that the name of Liquid Silk Bugoloobi is not reflected in our system and therefore is not a registered entity with us.”
How it happened
Court papers lodged indicate that Elvis cornered Masette in May 2014. “In May 2014 I entered into a per-registration agreement with Elvis to Incorporate Liquid Silk in Bugoloobi. Necessary papers were drawn by all parties for intended registration of the company,” Masette gives the genesis of the whole affair.
Masette recounts how thereafter Elvis approached him, claiming how he had registered the company. “He asked me to hand him USD155, 000 for the shares he was selling me,” the lawyer says.
Lucky is Masette, he parted with only with USD136000 at that time. He paid the money on the AFDC cheque dated August 28, 2014. Elvis had quoted a figure of USD 775000 as the cash that was required to kick start the operation of the joint then.
As a matter of fact, paying for his part of the shareholding, Masette and Elvis had executed a share holding agreement which gave Elvis 55 percent of the shares in Liquid silk while 25 percent was to go to the lawyer and the rest to tycoon Isaac Mulindwa. Elvis fronted Isaac as the chairman of board of directors for the company.
So good was the offer, Elvis promised under the agreement to offer all services enjoyed by the lawyer at Silk Liquid at half price. As it turns out, it is actually Elvis now enjoying such discounts by virtue of being the MD of Silk Events.
As you read this the deputy registrar of the commercial court Thaddeus Opisen has since sent out summons to Elvis and Liquid silk to file a defense giving their side of the story.
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