Dated: July 16 2013
By DAILY NEWS REPORTER
Judgment is to be heard at the Pietermaritzburg High Court on Tuesday in the fraud case of KwaZulu-Natal businessman Jabulani Mabaso.
It was alleged that Mabaso and his company, Indiza Infrastructure Solutions, defrauded the Department of Education of R200 million between 2005 and 2007. Mabaso supplied stationery for schools and allegedly inflated the prices.
However, the State then made an about-turn, conceding that Mabaso was entitled to make a profit on the stationery, and dropped the charges.
Mabaso was also charged with fraud and forgery, allegedly for not passing on discounts to the department and for producing fake invoices.
The State is pursuing a conviction on these charges.
Arguing on Monday, prosecutor Wendy Greef said invoices were created by Paul de Villiers and Gillian Broughton in 2007, who were employees of Mabaso at all the relevant times.
Greef submitted that in the case of forgery, a fraudulent perversion of the truth came into existence as soon as a falsified document was made. This, she argued, had been prejudicial to Palm Stationers, the supplier that Indiza used.
The evidence of De Villiers was that he had forged the first of two falsified Palm Stationers invoices on the instructions of Mabaso.
Greef said the obvious reason for the forgeries would have been to avoid paying tax.
Willie Vermeulen SC, applied for Mabaso’s acquittal. He said the State had failed to establish any financial prejudice to the department or Palm Stationers.
“This has been a waste of time.”
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