Tender fraud case against SANDF general’s wife postponed

The fraud case against the wife of a senior SA National Defence Force (SANDF) general has been given a lengthy postponement to allow for the defence to go through the docket, which is around 7 000 pages long.

Nombasa Ntsondwa-Ndhlovu briefly appeared in the Pretoria Specialised Commercial Crimes Court on Wednesday on fraud charges relating to tenders she scored from the SANDF.

It was previously reported that she was awarded a R24 million tender to transport SANDF equipment from African countries back to South Africa.

Ntsondwa-Ndhlovu is accused of providing false information and documents as part of the tender process.

She was awarded another contract of approximately R103 million to again transport SANDF equipment back to South Africa. However, this contract was cancelled as there was no longer a need for these services as soldiers had been recalled from these countries.

Ntsondwa-Ndhlovu still claimed R30 million of the contract, alleging that before the cancellation she had incurred expenses to that value.

On Wednesday, the State told the court the disclosure of the docket had been done, adding that it was a big pack of documents.

Due to the volume of the documents disclosed, the State asked for a lengthy postponement so that the defence could study the docket and take instructions from Ntsondwa-Ndhlovu.

The court was told there were in excess of 7 000 pages, of which around 2 500 were on a flash drive.

The defence said they expected trial readiness to be discussed at the next court appearance.

The matter was postponed to 12 April 2021.

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