DETECTIVES from the Commercial Crimes Division have
launched a manhunt for six Harare City Council employees who are at large over
the US$1 million Kuwadzana stands scam involving director of human resources,
Matthew Marara.
To date, 11 employees including Marara have been arrested
and appeared in court. They were remanded in custody.
They are facing charges of fraud or alternatively criminal
abuse of duty as public officers as defined by section 136 of the Criminal Law
(Codification and Reform) Act.
According to a leaked police memo seen by NewsDay Weekender
yesterday, the detectives are yet to arrest six outstanding employees to bring
the number nabbed in connection with the case to 17.
"Outstanding is to arrest the six accused persons who
are still at large and take them to court. ZRP Kuwadzana CR 134/09/19 and CID
Commercial Crimes Division (Northern Region) DR: 49/09/19, Rotten Row
Magistrate Court Record Book Number 52/20, Harare P6389-92/20," part of
the memo read.
Allegations are that Marara, who was acting HCC director of
housing and community services before being moved to his new portfolio, between
2017 and 2018, connived with the employees from different council departments
and allegedly hatched a plan to defraud the local authority.
In executing the plan, they identified open spaces in
Kuwadzana 3, 4, 5 and 6, and allegedly created a fictitious payment scheme and
originated fake layout plans.
They fraudulently connected water and created sundry
accounts for the purpose of selling the stands to homeseekers.
Thereafter, a total
of 150 stands in Kuwadzana area were allegedly handed over to Tapiwa Gona,
already on remand, for sale, who disposed of them through Northway Real Estate
Agency without council approval.
Proceeds from the sale were received by Northway Real
Estate, which then deposited the money into Gona's personal CABS bank account
1002651433.
Gona would then share the funds received from Northway Real
Estate Agency with various local authority employees, including Marara.
To cover the offence, Marara allegedly signed fraudulent
provisional allocation letters which were put into files created for each stand
in Kuwadzana 3, 4, 5 and 6 under the alleged pay scheme.
The offence was then discovered through a tip-off,
prompting a report to the police which led to the arrest of some of the
employees who were put on remand after implicating Marara.
Marara was first arrested on February 4 this year and taken
to court, but the prosecution directed that the matter proceeds by way of
summons after completion of investigations.
Investigations were completed on June 1 and he was
eventually taken to court for initial remand on July 1.
As a result of the alleged fraud, council suffered
financial prejudice of US$1 141 779,50 being the value of the stands disposed
of and nothing was recovered. Newsday
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