News / National
Government pays funeral company USD$400 million to supply fertiliser?
26 Aug 2019 at 15:18hrs | Views
The Government of Zimbabwe is alleged to have paid USD$400 million to a former funeral services company called FSG to provide fertiliser under the Command Agriculture program.
The officials from the Ministry of Finance were questioned by the Parliamentary Public Accounts Committee Chairperson Tendai Biti to provide details of the company and they all said they do not know anything about it.
Their response caused Biti to blast the officials saying they were going against the law which demands that they must know their client before they pay any money.
However, Open Parly tweeted that the company, "used to be a funeral services company, but it has a subsidiary for fertilisers, Sakunda is a fuel company too but it was also contracted to supply agricultural services and inputs."
In is not clear whether the said FSG is linked to FERTILISER, Seed Grain (FSG) whose managing director, Steve Morland was questioned by Parliament in 2018 over how his company got the contract to supply fertiliser to the presidential input scheme with suspicions that it did not through the required tender procedures.
"FSG is a local entity registered in 2010 and we started as a family business, and then we brought in overseas investors. I am not a Zimbabwean by birth and I am in the country on a temporary residence permit. I was born in Scotland and grew up in South Africa," Morland was quoted by the media saying.
The officials from the Ministry of Finance were questioned by the Parliamentary Public Accounts Committee Chairperson Tendai Biti to provide details of the company and they all said they do not know anything about it.
Their response caused Biti to blast the officials saying they were going against the law which demands that they must know their client before they pay any money.
Min of Finance paid over USD$400 million to a company called FCG on the pretext that it supplies fertilisers for CommandAgric but they don't know where this company is, they don't know who owns this company, they don't where it is located, FCG did not even go to tender. pic.twitter.com/NXjuZMmb3v
— NewZimbabwe.com (@NewZimbabweCom) August 26, 2019
In is not clear whether the said FSG is linked to FERTILISER, Seed Grain (FSG) whose managing director, Steve Morland was questioned by Parliament in 2018 over how his company got the contract to supply fertiliser to the presidential input scheme with suspicions that it did not through the required tender procedures.
"FSG is a local entity registered in 2010 and we started as a family business, and then we brought in overseas investors. I am not a Zimbabwean by birth and I am in the country on a temporary residence permit. I was born in Scotland and grew up in South Africa," Morland was quoted by the media saying.
Source - Byo24News
