Kampala Gold firm Washa Lidjiwe cited in Sh980m fraud, director arrested 

KAMPALA – Uganda’s State House Anti-Corruption Unit (SHACU), working with the Criminal Investigations Directorate (CID) and the Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions (ODPP), has charged Elizabeth Esther Steenkamp, a Kenyan national and Managing Director of Washa Lidjiwe Investments Limited, with obtaining money by false pretence and conspiracy to commit a felony in a high-value gold fraud case.
Steenkamp was arraigned before the Makindye Chief Magistrate’s Court and remanded.
Prosecutors allege that between June and August 2025, at Plot 244, Bemba Road, Munyonyo, Steenkamp and others still at large conspired to defraud American investor Vladimir Toussaint Yvens of USD 255,650 (roughly UGX 980 million) by promising to facilitate the export of 46 kilograms of gold from Kampala to New York.
The funds were purportedly needed for declaration fees, government royalties, and documentation, but the gold was never shipped, and communication with the complainant ceased.

The case comes against a backdrop of a spate of gold-related frauds in Uganda’s growing minerals sector, especially in Kampala and surrounding areas.
Authorities say cases of gold fraud have surged in 2025.
In one recent case, the Anti-Corruption Unit jointly with CID arrested seven individuals accused of defrauding a Nigerian businessman of USD 70,000 in a fake gold scheme, in which the defendants posed as gold exporters and supplied counterfeit gold bars.
Similarly, in September 2025, authorities arraigned Luyima Godfrey in Kampala for allegedly defrauding a South Korean investor of over USD 600,000 by claiming to supply 53 kilograms of gold, using forged documents and false identities.
Public records also indicate intensified enforcement: over 56 suspects in gold fraud cases had been linked to operations stretching across rentals and makeshift refineries in Kampala, from which about UGX 900 million (≈ USD 240,000) was recovered in an eight-month crackdown.
These cases have raised concerns about weak regulatory oversight, document forgery, and the use of shell companies to lure foreign investment.

ARE YOU A VICTIM OF GOLD TRADE FRAUD? CALL/TEXT / WHATSAPP: 0777959024 or EMAIL: redpeppertips@gmail.com , WITH AS MUCH EVIDENCE AS POSSIBLE.  SOURCE PROTECTION IS OUR NO.1 PRIORITY.
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