First Oil directors flee

The two First Oil Company (Private) Limited directors who are wanted on allegations of obstructing the course of justice after they allegedly connived with CMED (Pvt) Ltd managing director, Davison Mhaka, to cook up papers showing how $2,7 million in the botched fuel deal was spent, are believed to have fled to Malawi and Namibia.

Police are still keen to question the two directors Alex Kudakwashe Mahuni and Lynon Gilbert Katunga who are believed, together with Mhaka, to have masterminded the processing of fake documents through an IT expert in South Africa to conceal the case.

Mhaka was arrested recently and has since appeared in court. Sources close to the investigations yesterday said they had launched a manhunt for Mahuni and Katunga. It is alleged that Mahuni fled to Namibia while Katunga is in Malawi.

The two first fled to South Africa to evade arrest before heading for their new destinations. A senior CMED official yesterday revealed that this was meant to weaken the case. "This is why Mhaka wants the trial to start now because his other two accomplices have skipped the country.

"Before they fled the country they would regularly meet with Mhaka at a lodge along Natal Avenue in Avondale to strategise and I think that's the reason why they came up with this idea to flee the country," said the official.

The official said there was a need for Mhaka to be suspended since he was facing criminal charges as a public officer. "Our opinion is that Mhaka presented or processed fake documents as a public officer and therefore can't hold a public office. He should be suspended from his duties."

The official added that since Mhaka was reinstated, he had increased his salary and bought a Toyota Land Cruiser V8 at a time when other employees' salaries were cut by 20 percent.

"Fortunately enough the President (Robert Mugabe) will very soon know the truth as we will compile a dossier and present it to him with the real or actual facts of what's transpiring at CMED," said the official.

Police have been making efforts to locate Katunga and Mahuni at their respective houses in and around the city but without success.

The police are also investigating the whereabouts of the $300,000 which was withdrawn as cash at a time when the money amounting to $3 million was released by CMED.

The money was withdrawn by Brian Manjengwa the then parastatal's fuels manager, under the instruction of Mhaka. Mhaka appeared before Harare provincial magistrate Vakayi Chikwekwe facing charges of defeating or obstructing the course of justice and violating the Money Laundering and Proceeds of Crime Act.

He was remanded to April 20 on $500 bail.

It is alleged that in a bid to defeat the course of justice and to conceal the movement and disposal of the $2,7 million, Mhaka, working in cahoots with Mahuni and Katunga – who are still at large – approached an IT expert in South Africa through Daniel Chidenyu, a Zimbabwean national based in the neighbouring country.

Mhaka requested through Chidenyu that the IT expert, only identified as Pablo, concoct company registration documents and bank statements reflecting the disposal of the $2,7 million.

It is also alleged that sometime in November 2015, Mhaka on realising that their fictitious documents were not conclusive, contacted Chidenyu and instructed him to make closed circuit television footages purportedly showing one Killiana Bangure and Fanuel Kapanje withdrawing the fraudulently acquired funds from the bank.

Chidenyu reportedly turned him down citing that he had not been paid for the previous transaction.

Police carried out investigations into the authenticity of the documents through Interpol and it was confirmed that all the accounts and companies mentioned in the document did not exist.