Four SA truck drivers are expected to appear in the Harare Magistrate’s Court on Monday on fraud charges, the Sunday Independent reported.
Cassimjee Bilal (28) Henry Radebe (57) Samuel Risimati Baloyi and Sydney Masilo (40) were arrested on February 20 and released on bail. They were currently in a safe house in Harare and were said to be worried about their families.
They were apparently caught in a spat between Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe’s wife Grace, and her former business partner, Ping Sung Hsieh — also known as “Jack” — a Taiwanese-born South African, reported the paper.
The men were hired by Hsieh to deliver R7-million worth of trucks, trailers and equipment for Grace Mugabe’s Gushungu Dairy in Mazowe and machinery for a gold mine. The goods were delivered on February 19.
Grace Mugabe’s aide and VIP protection officer, Olga Bunga, claims in court papers the drivers and Hsieh had tried to defraud Mugabe of the R7-million. The money was transferred via the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe to one of Hsieh’s company’s, Chantrea Trading, in South Africa, in August 2008.
According to the Sunday Independent, Mugabe was using the court case to try and recover ownership of a R40-million home in Hong Kong she bought in 2008. Hsieh had since transferred the house back into his own name, apparently for tax reasons.
The row over the Hong Kong home apparently erupted after a dispute between “Jack” and Grace Mugabe over a gold mine they were developing in Chinhoyi in Zimbabwe.
The paper said Zimbabwe attorney general Johannes Tomana had visited South Africa last week in an attempt to extradite Hsieh to Zimbabwe to stand trial with the four truckers.
His extradition hearing was expected to take place in the Vanderbijlpark Magistrate’s Court in Gauteng on July 19. – Sapa