After the City of Johannesburg’s anti-corruption unit concluded investigations into the Joburg Market, one of the three alleged corrupt officials has been arrested and appeared in the Johannesburg Specialised Commercial Crimes Court on 10 March.
He was released on R10 000 bail and the case has been postponed to 20 April.
The City’s mayor, Herman Mashaba announced on 7 March that the three officials were suspended after R7.5 million in theft, fraud and corruption was uncovered by the unit headed by Shadrack Sibiya.
The mayor said the remaining two suspects were ‘on the run’ but he was confident they would be apprehended soon.
Read: Three suspended after R7.5 million fraud allegations
The Joburg Market, frequented by an estimated 11 000 buyers on a daily basis, suffered the loss because of alleged misrepresentation of the amounts of goods received through the market’s procurement process.
“Officials also fraudulently misrepresented the completeness of services rendered by some suppliers, causing substantial financial loss to the market. One such case of misrepresentation cost residents over R1 million,” Mashaba claimed.
Also read: Growth and food security at Joburg Market essential for the City
This goes a long way to explaining how, while working as a City official at the market, the arrested individual was driving around in a Ferrari, the mayor said.
Mashaba said he would not rest until his administration, which came into power after the hotly contested municipal elections last year, delivered clean governance.
“I would like to commend the Hawks for their swift action in effecting this arrest. I would also like to thank the unit for its efforts in ensuring this investigation was concluded.”
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