Man held over fake matric

A LIMPOPO University employee has been arrested in an alleged fraudulent qualifications scam in which he was paid millions of rands in salary.

The arrest of the university’s labour relations manager, Lesiba Lazarus Lebelo, comes a month before he was due to retire.

He is one of a number of high-profile people to be arrested recently over alleged fraudulent qualifications.

Lebelo, who is the subject of a national Hawks probe into people with apparently false qualifications, allegedly falsified his matric certificate.

Hawks spokesman Lieutenant Robert Netshiunda said Lebelo had been released on bail of R3 000 and was due to re-appear in court in November.

He said Lebelo allegedly used a fraudulent matric certificate to acquire employment at the university in 1996.

“Initial investigations have shown that the serial number of the certificate he used belonged to someone else,” Netshiunda said.

Lebelo had fraudulently earned more than R10-million during his 19 years of service, he said.

Police were also probing the legitimacy of his other certificates, including undergraduate qualifications and short-course certificates.

“This is part of wider investigation into fraudulent certificates,” Netshiunda said.