HARARE (AFP) — Zimbabwean police arrested a British businessman, Nicholas van Hoogstraten, after finding a large quantity of foreign currency and pornographic material in his possession, state media reported Saturday.
Police spokesman Wyane Bvudzijena told the state-run Herald newspaper that Van Hoogstraten had been charging rents on properties he owned in foreign currency and illegally dealing in foreign currency.
Van Hoogstraten, 63, was found with 37,586 US dollars, 92,880 rands, 190 British pounds and 180 Botswana pula, totalling the equivalent of some 51,000 US dollars, as well as 20 billion Zimbabwe dollars (66,500 US), the reports said.
State television showed him in a white short-sleeved shirt as well as the wads of local and foreign currency recovered at his home in the capital.
"Van Hoogstraten's arrest (on Thursday) evening at about 0900 pm (0700 GMT) follows reports received by the police to the effect that he was charging his tenants in foreign currency," Bvudzijena said.
"He owns about 200 properties in Harare and Bulawayo," Zimbabwe's second city, the spokesman added. "The properties include houses, flats and shops."
He alleged that Van Hoogstraten demanded six months' rent in foreign currency from his tenants.
"The police informant had been asked to pay in the region of 8,000 US dollars.
"Van Hoogstraten is being charged under the Exchange Control Regulations for charging a service and dealing in foreign currency. He is also facing charges under the Censorship Act," he said, adding that the businessman would appear in court once investigations were completed.
Since October last year, Zimbabwe has faced a serious shortages of its currency blamed by the central bank chief Gideon Gono on cash barons whom he accuses of hoarding Zimbabwe dollars and exchanging them for scarce foreign currency.
Van Hoogstraten has a reputation in Britain as a ruthless property developer who bought thousands of slum properties and reportedly described his tenants as "filth".
The multi-millionaire was convicted in 2002 of the manslaughter of an associate and was sentenced to ten years imprisonment but the conviction was quashed the following year and he was freed.
In 2005, the family of the dead man, Mohammed Raja, took civil action against him and the High Court ruled on the balance of probability that he was involved in the killing by recruiting two hitmen.
Van Hoogstraten has spoken warmly of Zimbabwe's President Robert Mugabe, describing him as "100 percent decent and incorruptible", the BBC reported.
He was building the biggest private house commissioned in Britain for 100 years in East Sussex, southern England, which would have been bigger than Buckingham Palace, but the project is currently in limbo.
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