Duo dupes fellow security guards

Twenty security guards are counting their losses after their workmates swindled them of $19 094 in subscription fees for non-existent housing stands.

Security guards Clever Mandaza and Gervas Zanga appeared before Harare magistrate Tilda Mazhande on Thursday facing charges of fraud.

They were remanded out of custody on $100 bail.

Allegations are that sometime in 2012 Mandaza and Zanga who were chairperson and secretary of the workers' committee at Safeguard Security Company hatched a plan to defraud their fellow workmates by forming an unregistered cooperative and named it Zivanguva Housing Cooperative.

Pursuant to their plan, the duo misrepresented to the complainants that if they joined the cooperative they would be allocated residential stands in Eastview and Nyatsime measuring 200 square metres and valued at $3 500.

The court heard that between June 30 2012 and January 31 2017, complainants were requested to pay a deposit of $1 000 for them to be allocated the stands.

The balance was to be paid in monthly instalments ranging from $32 to $100 towards the purchase of the residential stands.

The offence came to light after the 20 complainants had paid the required deposit and requested for allocation of the residential stands only to realise that the stands were non-existent.

Complainants also made an effort to check the housing cooperative bank account only to discover there was $40 prompting them to make a police report leading to the arrest of the duo.