NPA believes accused in police PPE fraud case used as a front for contracts
The National Prosecuting Authority (NPA)’s Investigating Directorate said that it believed that one of the accused in the case of 15 people linked to the alleged R1.9 million police PPE corruption was used as a front in companies that profited from several multimillion-rand contracts.
Salamina Khoza (67) told the court that she was unemployed and survived on a Sassa pension grant but the State said that she was the sole director in at least three companies, one of which did business with the police.
Khoza is one of three accused granted R5,000 bail in the Palm Ridge Magistrates Court on Tuesday.
The group all face charges of theft, fraud, corruption and forgery in connection with an alleged scheme to unlawfully benefit from a third-party supplier of latex gloves for the police nationally.
Bail proceedings for the remaining 12 accused are expected to continue on Wednesday.
A soft-spoken Khoza admitted to the court that she was indeed the director of the companies listed by the State prosecutor during bail proceedings but denied that she received millions from several contracts, including more than R3 million received from doing business with the police.
The Investigating Directorate’s Sindisiwe Seboka said that the State believed that there was someone else involved.
“We do have reason to believe that there was another person who was operating the account on behalf of accused number two,” Seboka said.
With that said, Seboka said that Khoza was still liable for the companies’ dealings as the sole director and more on this would be pursued when the matter went to trial.
Meanwhile, the State will be opposing bail for 12 of the accused who face schedule six offences.
-EWN
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