The Directorate for Priority Crime Investigation (DPCI), known more familiarly as the Hawks, said on Sunday, 03 May 2020 that its National Clean Audit Task Team has nabbed another suspect who was involved in the Tshwane metro multimillion corruption scandal. The 44-year-old man was arrested in Durban and charged with alleged fraud, money-laundering, and corruption, after an investigation.
The alleged stolen money, which amounts to R53-million, was earmarked for the National Fund for Municipality Workers and is said to have been taken from the municipality’s account on 30 August 2019.
The Hawks, together with the National Prosecuting Authority of South Africa’s Assets Forfeiture Unit, managed to freeze R400 000 of the stolen money.
The man will appear at the Empangeni Magistrate’s Court on Monday. In December last year the Hawks arrested 62-year-old Ivo Gunter Wegrostek on fraud, money laundering, and corruption charges after an investigation was conducted. The crime-busting unit said that the investigation revealed evidence that the stolen money was allegedly laundered from a company (I didn’t want to name the company as yet as I haven’t been able to get their contact details or a comment from them) into several businesses, as well as local and international bank accounts owned by Wegrostek’s relatives.
It is alleged that Wegrostek and the other suspect used these businesses and banks to launder the money stolen from the municipality. Wegrostek is out on bail of R100 000, under strict conditions which include, among others, “restricted international travelling, reporting daily at the Douglasdale SAPS, not to leave Gauteng without the consent of the investigating officer and he was also ordered to handover his Austrian and South African passports.”
The DPCI said Wegrostek’s case was remanded to 21 May 2020 in the Specialised Commercial Crime Court, in Pretoria, and expects the second case to be similarly remanded. The suspect will then join the matter against Wegrostek as accused number two.
National Hawks head Lieutenant-General Godfrey Lebeya said he commended the team that made the arrests. “I appreciate the efforts made by the team to gather enough evidence to link these suspects. No stone shall be left unturned until everyone who participated in the looting is accounting for such action” said Lebeya.
