The Pretoria High Court has ordered Standard Bank to freeze the bank accounts of suspected Ponzi scheme Lyoness South Africa.
The application was brought on Sunday evening by Jianliu Lin and her husband Adriaan van den Bergh, both members of the multi-level marketing scheme that was founded in Austria in 2003 by Hubert Friedl as a customer loyalty scheme offering discounts and cash back to participating merchants and customers.
Lyoness subsequently spread to roughly 40 countries, operating under a variety of names, including Lyconet and myWorld.
The ex parte (where the court hears only one side of the case) application was brought late on Sunday so that Standard Bank could be served with the order first thing on Monday (29 August) to prevent any transfer of funds out of the company bank account.
The application claims that Lyoness and various related schemes are “being operated almost solely for illegal and/or fraudulent purposes”.
Lin says in her affidavit that she invested more than R6 million into the scheme, and suspects she may have lost it all, and will likely be investigated herself for participating in the scheme.
“I bring this application not for selfish reasons but rather in the public interest,” she deposes, adding that she is both a participant and victim of the scheme.
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Lin said she was introduced to Lyoness by a member of the Chinese community, and bought her first ‘personal international unit’ for R25 000. She didn’t fully…
