South African air charter company Execujet has been accused of flouting international aviation regulations when it failed to declare the identity of five “secret” passengers it flew to Bloemfontein last week.

Onboard a LearJet owned by the South African mining company Delmon Mining and Civils‚ were the relatives and top lieutenants of the infamous Gupta family. The flight took off from Lanseria airport on Thursday and was used to ferry Varun Gupta‚ Nazeem Howa‚ Ashu Chawla‚ Kamal Vasrum and Ronica Ragavan to Bloemfontein so they could appear in the magistrate’s court on charges of fraud‚ theft and for allegedly contravening the Organised Crimes Act and the Public Finance Management Act.

Our sister publication Times Select has learnt that the Guptas’ company Oakbay Investments asked Execujet to fly the five to court. Execujet did not have an aircraft available that day and hired ZS-OPR from Delmon Mining and Civils.

Execujet‚ however‚ failed to inform the mining company who had chartered its aircraft or provide a list of passengers‚ as required by the Civil Aviation Authority’s regulations.

Times Select has learnt from a source with knowledge of the flight that the identity of those onboard was kept quiet.

“It was kept a deliberate secret‚” the source said.

For the full story‚ visit Times Select.