MBOMBELA – The fraud case against former HOD of the Department of Community Safety, Security and Liaison, Mr Thulani Sibuyi and GNT security owner Mr Vusi Mashaba has been postponed to February next year.
Sibuyi is alleged to have committed fraud totalling a whopping R7 billion.
Mashaba is being charged with allegedly using a fraudulent tax-clearance certificate, worth about R4 million a month, when he applied for a tender from the department. It was reported that the Hawks had started investigating the awarding of security contracts in 2011.
The verdict in this matter was expected to be delivered on Monday, but had to be postponed because two state witnesses that were in the employ of the South African Revenue Service at the time of the alleged fraud, are unable to testify before or on Monday.
This surfaced after Pumlani Zuma, an investigator with the provincial Hawks office, testified for the state. The Hawks were instructed to investigate the tender assigned to GNT security and referred the service level agreement that was signed between Sibuyi and Mashaba to SARS for a forensic investigation.
One of the witnesses has indicated that she is recovering from an operation and will be unable to attend court for six months, while the other, who does not work for SARS anymore, will have to arrange travel arrangements in order to attend.
Mr Macbeth Ncongwane, the legal representative for both accused parties, indicated that his clients are very disappointed by this delay. “Justice delayed is justice denied. The state prosecutor never served subpoenas to the witnesses in this case and was therefore not ready for the trail at the time of the trial.”
