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South Africa: How Police Lent Credibility to the Morita Pyramid Scheme
An investigation into the Morita Forestry scheme reveals it was a pyramid scheme that defrauded South Africans of hundreds of millions of rands. Social media influencers and the company's local director promoted it, while appearances by police and government officials at events helped create an aura of legitimacy.
An investigation by AllAfrica has detailed how the Morita Forestry scheme, which collapsed in late July, defrauded South Africans of hundreds of millions of rands. Central to the scheme's success was its ability to project legitimacy, bolstered by appearances from police and government officials at company events.
Coverage Comparison
The coverage of the Morita Forestry scheme in AllAfrica spans two articles. The first, published as the scheme began to collapse, focuses on the mechanics of the pyramid scheme and the role of social media influencers. The second, a follow-up, examines the involvement of state institutions in lending credibility to the scheme through their participation in events.
Key Claims
Morita Forestry was a pyramid scheme that promised daily payouts to investors in woodland projects in the United States. The scheme began in August 2025 and stopped processing withdrawals in July 2026.
According to AllAfrica, the scheme defrauded South Africans of hundreds of millions of rands. It was operated by a Chinese syndicate and used a Chinese-run payment platform to siphon funds via cryptocurrency. The platform had over 385,000 registered accounts.
Social media influencers and the company's local director, Puleng Violet Phakisi, encouraged people to invest. Influencers were paid by the company to market the scheme.
Police officers from the South African Police Service (SAPS) and officials from the Department of Forestry, Fisheries and the Environment (DFFE) participated in Morita-organized events, including tree-planting ceremonies. These events were photographed and filmed, and the images were used in promotional materials.
The Department of Forestry, Fisheries and the Environment stated it had no official relationship with Morita Forestry. However, the Rand West City Municipality said it was introduced to Morita by the DFFE.
AllAfrica reports that none of the state institutions conducted due diligence before partnering with Morita on events.
Perspectives
The Department of Forestry, Fisheries and the Environment stated it had no official relationship with Morita Forestry. The Rand West City Municipality claimed it was introduced to Morita by the DFFE, suggesting a chain of introduction between the two bodies.
Victims of the scheme have expressed that they invested because they saw marketing materials featuring police officers, leading them to believe the scheme was credible. Some victims have expressed suicidal feelings on social media, according to AllAfrica.
How this outlet told it
AllAfrica
Framing: Exposé of a large-scale pyramid scheme — Investigative and critical
Facts Included:
Morita Forestry is a pyramid scheme
The scheme claimed to pay people out daily if they invested in woodland projects in the US
Social media influencers and the company's local director encouraged people to invest
The scheme has scammed South Africans out of hundreds of millions of rands
The scheme started in August 2025 and stopped paying out in July 2026
The scheme used a Chinese-run payment platform to syphon money via cryptocurrency
Each row is one claim, attributed to the outlet whose wording states it most clearly. Confidence rates how directly the source text states the claim — explicit and unhedged rates high; hedged, pieced-together, or internally inconsistent statements rate lower. It does not measure whether the claim is true. Status counts the distinct outlets we found asserting it — so a single-source claim can still show high confidence, and a multi-source claim can show medium. Every one of those outlets is named beside the status, so you can check the count against the list. For claims extracted before we began storing that list, the row says so: it names the outlet the claim is quoted from and states that we have not recorded which outlets backed it. Outlets wrote at different times, so a figure that evolves — a casualty count, for example — can legitimately differ between rows; check the "as of" time next to each claim's source.
Claim
Confidence
Status
ClaimMorita Forestry is a pyramid scheme that claimed to pay people out daily if they invested in woodland projects in the US.