Sentence handed out in Mpumalanga DoE fraud case
Three people accused of defrauding Mpumalanga’s Department of Education (DoE) of almost R6 million were sentenced.
Mbombela – Thieves hacked into the DoE’s financial management system and defrauded it under the guise of being service providers.
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The trio convicted on three counts of theft, appeared in the Nelspruit Regional Court and were sentenced on Friday.
According to senior state Adv Patrick Nkuna, Musawenkosi Sigasa (47) was sentenced to 12 years’ imprisonment, Thabang Gaakarekoe (51) to 10 years’ imprisonment, and Jabulile Gladys Gaakarekoe who is 80 years old, was sentenced to 10 years’ imprisonment, wholly suspended for five years.
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The accused all initially pleaded not guilty to all charges.
In 2009 the DoE discovered that there were certain suspicious transactions that were effected from within the DoE’s financial management and accounting supply chain system, which was hacked by the accused. Various payments were made into Nedbank and Absa bank accounts totalling R5,5 million. Officials at the DoE, whose passwords and usernames were used to authorise the payments, were on leave at the time of the commission of these offences.
Nkuna told the court that the accused were traced by their close corporation’s registration documents, bank account statements, cellphone recharge transactions and the evidence of technical expert witnesses from Vodacom, Absa and a report from the Companies Intellectual Commission (CIPC).
In passing judgement the court stated that the money that was stolen from the DoE could not be recovered and that the accused who benefited from the stolen money, did not show any visible remorse.
