South African tycoon Zunaid Moti has built a school named after Botswana's president

President Duma Boko unveiled a school and clinic bearing his own name in Gaborone on Saturday, built by a company belonging to the South African businessman who financed his party's 2019 election campaign.

The Duma Boko School and Clinic sits in Block 7, at the corner of Sekoma Road and Basotho Drive, and was built by African Hero, an infrastructure initiative linked to Zunaid Moti's Moti Group. Boko is African Hero's founding chairperson and led the unveiling alongside Moti at an invitation-only event.

Moti financed the Umbrella for Democratic Change, the coalition Boko leads, during its 2019 general election campaign. Gaborone mayor Oarabile Motlaleng acknowledged it publicly during a council debate on the project, saying the party was not hiding that Moti had played a part when it asked for his help.

The facility puts education and healthcare under one roof, accommodating about 380 learners and 288 daily consultations on what African Hero describes as a technology-enabled campus, built from prefabricated units in one to two months per facility.

Botswana's finance ministry had rejected the proposal.

Tshokologo Kganetsano, permanent secretary at the ministry, told the Public Accounts Committee last year that an investor had proposed building clinics and schools and renting them back to the government once complete. The financial implications were huge, he said, which is why the ministry sent the proposal back, adding that the government was not in a position to borrow to fund it and preferred open competitive bidding.

The structure was a 17-year lease-to-own arrangement using clinics and schools made from renovated shipping containers. Mmegi reported the cost as 9.1 million pula for a single clinic, about $668,078, and 36.4 million pula for a school, roughly $2.67 million.

Months later the pilot emerged as African Hero's flagship.

Who Moti is

The businessman standing beside Boko has one of the most contested reputations in southern African business.

Moti founded the Moti Group, a Johannesburg conglomerate spanning mining, property and financial services that amaBhungane has described as a multi-billion rand operation. He is routinely characterised in South African media as a controversial rags-to-riches figure, and he has been arrested on criminal charges in both Germany and South Africa.

His central asset for years was Zimbabwean. The Moti Group became a major shareholder in African Chrome Fields in 2014, mining and processing chromite in central Zimbabwe, and it also built FerroChrome Furnaces, a chrome smelting venture in South Africa.

He was arrested at Munich airport on Aug. 19, 2018 as he was leaving Germany, on an Interpol red notice arising from a dispute with the Russian businessman Alibek Issaev, an estranged prospective investor in the smelting business. He spent months in a German prison before being released. amaBhungane later described the notice as seemingly manufactured.

The Moti Files

The most damaging coverage came in 2023.

amaBhungane published a series of investigations based on leaked internal documents, reporting that Moti had enjoyed a close personal relationship with Zimbabwe's President Emmerson Mnangagwa and Vice President Constantino Chiwenga, and had repeatedly leaned on them for help in business and personal matters. The Sentry, an American investigative organisation, published its own report on his African Chrome Fields dealings the same year.

Moti rejected all of it. He denied that he or African Chrome Fields received any undue or improper benefit from the relationship with Zimbabwe's government, denied any involvement in capturing the Zimbabwean state, and said the company conducts itself like any other international investor there and complies with all relevant regulations. He described the amaBhungane allegations as ridiculous and said he was not guilty of any wrongdoing.

He also said the documents were stolen. The Moti Group accused a former employee, the attorney Clinton van Niekerk, of taking more than 4,000 confidential files, and laid criminal charges in both Zimbabwe and South Africa. Van Niekerk was arrested at King Shaka International Airport in January 2023, released two days later when a court set the arrest aside, and is now reported to be in witness protection.

The group obtained a gag order against amaBhungane from Johannesburg High Court judge John Holland-Muter, granted in chambers without notice, ordering the journalists to return the documents within 48 hours. It was overturned on appeal in July 2023.

Moti resigned as chief executive of the Moti Group later that year. He has said amaBhungane is pursuing a vendetta against him.

Botswana next

Questions about ownership have followed the school project.

The Gazette reported that the completed building displays the logos of African Hero, Jindal Power and the Aga Isago Development and Empowerment Foundation, and that African Hero Botswana operates as New Delights, a private company linked to the Moti Group. The businessman Ramachandran Ottapathu has distanced himself from New Delights, saying he only helped a friend register it while its directors awaited work permits.

Kesitegile Gobotswang told the newspaper the government must be transparent about the terms of the partnership between the administration, Moti's African Hero, Jindal and what he called the lesser-known Aga Isago foundation. He said African Hero had described building 50 schools and 100 clinics on a 6.8-hectare plot in Block 7.

The Aga Isago Development and Empowerment Foundation, financed by the Moti Group, says its model covers designing, manufacturing, constructing, equipping and maintaining social infrastructure in partnership with governments, development institutions and private companies. The group calls it its flagship social-impact venture.

Malawi sent its second vice president, Enock Kanzingeni Chihana, to Saturday's launch on behalf of President Peter Mutharika. The initiative is expected to extend across the Southern African Development Community, including Malawi.

Moti is separately distributing 6,000 footballs to children across Botswana.