A second prosecution witness on Saturday denied that Zimbabwe’s former finance minister Chris Kuruneri smuggled out funds to buy a mansion in South Africa and flouted the country’s tough foreign-exchange laws.
Christopher Hayman of Cape Town, South Africa, told the High Court in Harare that Kuruneri invested in various properties in South Africa with proceeds from consultancy work he did outside Zimbabwe before he was appointed Cabinet minister.
Hayman, a property developer, said he helped Kuruneri to open a bank account in South Africa and invest in various properties through Choice Decisions, a company of which Kuruneri was director.
”Dr Kuruneri said these were free funds earned even before he came to Zimbabwe,” Hayman said under cross-examination by defence lawyer Jonathan Samkange.
”I was led to believe the funds came from a source outside Zimbabwe and until it is proved otherwise I will continue to work on that presumption.”
He said he met Kuruneri in April 2002 and that the former minister appointed him to manage his investments in South Africa.
Kuruneri faces seven counts of breaching Zimbabwe’s exchange-control laws by allegedly transferring $500 000, £37 000, €30 000 and R1,2-million to buy and renovate an eight-bedroom mansion.
The former minister has denied the charge, saying the house was bought and rebuilt by a South African investment company of which he was director.
He said he bought shares in Choice Decisions 113 and invested in the other properties with proceeds from consultancy work he did outside Zimbabwe.
A South African lawyer, Lorenzo Aldo Dominico Bruttamesso, testifying in the high-profile trial on Friday, said Kuruneri moved money legally from his account in Harare to buy shares in a property in Cape Town.
Bruttamesso represented Dunmow Limited, a South African company that sold shares for a house in Cape Town three years ago to Choice Decisions 113.
Samkange said Kuruneri had life savings in Spain, which he moved to South Africa after he was included on the list of Zimbabwean politicians placed under targeted sanctions by the European Union and the United States.
”It is these funds that the accused invested in South Africa,” the lawyer said.
Judge Susan Mavangira on Thursday convicted Kuruneri of breaching the country’s citizenship laws after he confessed to holding a Canadian passport in addition to a Zimbabwean diplomatic passport.
Zimbabwean law does not allow dual citizenship.
The judge is due to sentence Kuruneri for flouting citizenship laws at the end of his trial.
Kuruneri was arrested in April last year at the height of the Zimbabwean government’s anti-graft crusade, becoming the senior-most official to face charges of corruption. He has been in remand prison since.
The trial is to continue on Monday with further testimony from prosecution witnesses. — Sapa-AFP