Second state witness testifies in Bay IPTS fraud trial
Large sums of money meant for the good of Nelson Mandela Bay residents, through the R298m injected into the Bay’s beleaguered Integrated Public Transport System, was siphoned off within a single financial year.
Testifying in the Gqeberha high court yesterday, Marissa Morris, who at the time worked for the National Treasury, said that on May 31 2012, a grant claim was gazetted allowing municipalities to apply for funding to upgrade and implement routes, lanes, stations, depots and control centres, among other aspects.
According to Morris, during the 2010/2011 period, only 25 buses had been operational with 1.6km of road upgraded for the Bay IPTS.
Morris said some of the conditions stipulated to receive funding were based on the IPTS plans having been approved by the municipality, with network and financial models provided.
Morris is the second state witness to testify in the multimillion-rand fraud and racketeering trial of nine accused, as well as a Bay law firm.
At the start of the trial, the state’s first witness, forensic investigator and former assistant director of Deloitte, Burt Botha, told the court that businessman Fareed Fakir, former ANC regional secretary Zandisile Qupe, Bay law firm Le Roux Inc and its director David le Roux, along with former municipal head initially in charge of the IPTS projects, Mhleli Tshamase, then metro head of infrastructure and engineering, Walter Shaidi, disgraced businesswoman Andrea Wessels, her son Rukaard Abrahams, former assistant director in the metro’s budget and treasury department, Nadia Gerwel, as well as axed Bay deputy mayor and former ANC MPL Chippa Ngcolomba were identified in a 2015 report into the misuse of funds meant for the IPTS.
They have all pleaded not guilty to 16 counts of fraud, two of racketeering, 59 of money laundering, 53 of corruption, two of contravening the Criminal Procedure Act (CPA) for supplying false information, two of contravening the CPA for impeding an accounting officer, and five of contravening the CPA by failing to report suspicious or unusual transactions.
It is alleged that between August 2013 and May 2015, the accused worked together using an alleged illegal enterprise to line their own pockets with money provided to the metro by the National Treasury for the implementation of the IPTS.
According to the state, the alleged illegal enterprise was established using now defunct companies registered in the names of Fakir, Wessels and Abrahams, to make sure the procurement processes of the metro, as well as its department’s system of financial and internal controls, were captured in an irregular manner by using a seemingly legitimate approach.
The case continues.