The world’s largest aerospace company and leading
manufacturer of aircraft and other equipment — Boeing — has been sucked into
the Zimbabwe Airways saga where the son-in-law of former president Robert
Mugabe, Simba Chikore (alias Mutsahuni), was involved in massive corruption
that prejudiced the country of huge amounts of money between 2017 and 2018.
America’s biggest manufacturing exporter, Boeing, which
also offers defence, space and security systems, and is a service provider of
aftermarket support as well as performance-based logistics and training, worked
for the irregularly-constituted Zimbabwe Airways without a contract, documents
in The Herald’s possession show.
Boeing had a contract with Air Zimbabwe in 2016 but
transferred services to Zimbabwe Airways when the latter was controversially
constituted as a new alternative, debt-free entity funded by Treasury.
Additionally, Boeing was paid money for the training of Mr
Chikore, which never materialised as he was unable to fly the
Zimbabwe Airways planes due to the absence of an Air Operators Certificate for
the airline.
Interestingly, the Boeing team began cosying up to the
Mugabe family and would attend State functions, indicating the hand of the
former First Family in the affair.
A source with intimate knowledge of the goings-on told The
Herald this week that high-level meetings were held between Zimbabwean and
American officials in 2016 to engage Boeing.
The Zimbabwean team included Chikore and a Captain Chitsike
and the Boeing team consisted of the main consultant — Michael Castle, Tim Sikora and Konisha Shetty
— all from the Boeing Head Office in Seattle, United States.
“Boeing were paid US$1 030 500 by the Reserve Bank of
Zimbabwe for their services to help in the restructuring of the national
airline,” the source said.
By March Messrs Castle and Sikora were expected to be
working with Zimbabwe Airways to set up the company and its systems including
software, marketing, ticketing, branding and hiring of pilots and cabin crew.
Revealed our source: “The Boeing team was no longer working
for Air Zimbabwe but were now working with Zimbabwe Airways even though they
were still contractually bound to Air Zimbabwe and had received funds from the
Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe to assist in the restructuring of the national
airline.
“From March 2017 when the Boeing team were in the country,
they would attend state functions and were introduced to the former First
Family.”
The Herald is in possession of a picture in which Mr Sikora
is seen with the former First Family and the business plan is in the hands of
the former president, Robert Mugabe.
The next detail involved Mr Chikore’s abortive training.
Said the source: “Boeing then organised for a chief pilot
to be contracted by Zimbabwe Airways. The Chief Pilot was to help Simba Chikore
get his certification.
“He was to be paid US$30 000 per month. The conundrum was
that Zimbabwe Airways did not have any aircraft delivered yet, but once
delivered, the Chief Pilot would fly the B777 with Simba in order for Simba to
get his flying hours.
“The only problem was that the airline did not have an AOC
(Air Operators Certificate). Ultimately, there was no work for the Chief Pilot
to do but was to be paid anyway. The payment was to go to Boeing. Tangible work
by Boeing was not evident,” our source said.
Unimpeachable evidence also shows that Mr Chikore bulldozed
the (then named) Harare International Airport to build a ticketing office for
Zimbabwe Airways.
“They constructed the airport offices without a lease
agreement being concluded with the Civil Aviation Authority (CAAZ).
“When asked by (property company named) about the rentals,
Simba refused saying that he would not pay such amounts for airport property.
“To this day a lease still has not been concluded. The
offices are vacant and are not being used.”
The contractors used — and paid — for the airport offices
were the same that were building Mr Chikore’s private home in Umwinsdale,
Harare.
For all the money that flew around, The Herald has it on
good authority that, no statutory payment were made to the Zimbabwe Revenue
Authority, including PAYE and sundry tax remittances from the period of 2017 to
date. Herald
0 comments:
Post a Comment