More senior officials nabbed for defrauding Free State municipality

Two more senior executives have been arrested for allegedly defrauding the Maluti-a-Phofung municipality in the Free State of more than R4.6 million.

Municipality chief financial officer Nrateng Khumalo and expenditure manager Diakanyo Khampepe were arrested on Thursday and subsequently appeared on Friday where they were granted R10,000 and R1,000 bail respectively.

They were ordered by the Phuthaditjaba Magistrate’s Court to surrender their passports to investigators. They were also warned not to interfere with witnesses, according to Hawks spokesperson Brigadier Hangwani Mulaudzi.

They are among five other suspects who are expected to appear in the Bethlehem Regional Court on April 4 on charges of fraud and corruption related to the awarding of a tender in October 2016 to company Zero Tolerance.

The five suspects, among them four senior officers from the municipality and the company director for Configen, currently trading as Zero Tolerance, were busted in December last year by the Hawks.

Mokoena Robert Tsupa, 46; Abraham Moratwe Mofokeng, 47; Mabidikwana Wilfred Matjele, 61; Nkgaudise Nelson Molefe, 39; and Tefo Warnic Montsitsi, 50, allegedly colluded with Zero Tolerance during October 2016, and awarded the company a tender to provide protection and security services to the municipality without adhering to the correct supply chain management processes in terms of the Municipal Finance Management Act.

The municipality reportedly lost almost R4.6 million as a result of the alleged irregular and wasteful expenditure.

The five appeared in court in December and were each granted R10,000 bail. Warrants for their arrests were issued by the Hawks’ corruption investigation unit, who were investigating the awarding of the security tender to Zero Tolerance.

Documents seized by the Hawks revealed that Zero Tolerance was at some point appointed by Dihlabeng Local Municipality to render similar services.

This led to the Zero Tolerance appointment being declared unlawful by the Free State High Court in Bloemfontein and the tender was set aside, according to News24.

Tsupa, the then municipal manager, allegedly made the appointment for Zero Tolerance to run the protection and security services for the municipality using the contract even though it was declared unlawful and set aside by the high court.

(Compiled by Gopolang Chawane)

EDITOR’S NOTE: This article was previously published with a picture of Vusi Tshabalala, the former mayor of the Maluti-a-Phofung municipality. Tshabalala has no further connection to the content of this article and we regret using his picture to illustrate the report. 16:46, March 11, 2019.

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