The fraud charge covers his claims for the maximum in his
school fees allowance for three children for the third term of 2021, all three
terms last year and the first term this year, although he had only two children
needing school fees.
The obstruction of justice charge arises from his attempts
to block investigations by having the ZimStat internal auditor suspended and
dismissed.
The State and its witness, who is investigating officer
Eric Chacha of the Zimbabwe Anti-Corruption Commission (ZACC), had opposed the
granting of bail.
It is the State’s case that on June 24, 2019, Mahonde
entered into a contract of employment with ZimStat for the position of
director-general. The contract included, among other things, an educational
allowance for himself and his children.
The court heard that on September 3, 2021, ZimStat board of
directors increased the education allowance for the director-general to US$800
a child a term for a maximum of three children, making a maximum of US$2 400 if
there were three or more children.
The same day Mahonde allegedly claimed this maximum
allowance for the third term of 2021 and ZimStat paid $206 532, the equivalent
of US$2 400 converted at interbank rate of that day into Mahonde’s bank account.
Mahonde had only two children of school-going age so the claim for a third was
allegedly fraudulent.
On January 24 last year, Mahonde is alleged to have
generated a memo in which he allegedly misrepresented that the school fees for
his three children was US$2 400. The next day ZimStat paid $270 775, the
equivalent to US$2 400 for the first term converted at the rate of US$1: $112.
On May 22 last year, Mahonde claimed the second term fees
of US$2 400 and the next day, ZimStat paid $398 386, the equivalent at the
interbank rate of US$1: $165.994.
On September 6 last year, Mahonde claimed the third term
fees again of US$2 400 and ZimStatpaid him $1 392 448, the equivalent at the
then rate. On January 23 this year, he claimed first term fees for three children
and was paid $1 756 808.
However, this time it is alleged that between September
2021 to January 2023, Mahonde had only two school going children; one at a
primary school and one at a nursery school.
Investigations established that all the payments made by
ZimStat towards Mahonde’s children’s school fees were paid into his personal
account and that his claims were not supported by school invoices.
The fraudulent claims were unearthed during an internal
audit conducted by Mr Claudius Matiza, in his capacity as head of internal
audit at ZimStat.
On April 20 this year, Mahonde allegedly tried to obstruct
the investigations through suspending Matiza. It is reported that Matiza had
been assisting ZACC with investigations since March 1, in relation to Mahonde.
In a bid to frustrate the completion of investigations,
Mahonde allegedly dismissed Matiza so he could not provide evidence to the
investigators. Herald
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