Chronicle Editor
Thupeyo Muleya, Beitbridge Bureau
THE trial of two men accused of using fake immigration stamps to clear travellers into Zimbabwe and South Africa has been set for next Tuesday.
Farai Moyana (42) and Trymore Mhlanga (30) of Dulivhadzimu suburb are also accused of processing fake Covid-19 clearance certificates for people travelling between the two countries. The two men were arrested on April 5 by a security team comprising the police and immigration officers as they went about their illegal business in the border town.
Moyana and Mhlanga have been charged with violating sections of the Immigration Act and the Criminal Law (Codification and Reform) Act respectively.
Beitbridge Magistrate Ms Annia Chimweta remanded them out of custody on $20 000 bail each pending trial. Prosecuting, Ms Fezile Mpofu said on April 5 at around 11am, immigration officials from the Compliance and Enforcement Section at Beitbridge Border Post received a tip-off that the duo was running an illegal immigration office in the town.
The officials teamed up with the police and raided the duo at a house and recovered two fake MEDLABS Covid-19 clearance certificates which had been processed for Kizito and Patience Mupodori.
She said the team also found the two in possession of one fake Zimbabwean immigration date stamp, one fake South African immigration stamp, a Canon printer, a Toshiba laptop, stapler, 16 gig memory card and Toshiba laptop they were using to run their operations.
The prosecutor said the items were confiscated together with four Zimbabwean passports belonging to Gerald Takudzwa, Ronald Tanaka, Junior Kudzai, and Nomsa Ndlovu.
The passports were pending “clearance” by the duo. The matter comes a few weeks after another fake stamps mastermind Thomas Chidza was fined $100 000 for a similar offence.
Chidza was found in possession of two fake Zimbabwean and three South African immigration stamps and seven Zimbabwean passports which he was “processing.” In 2017, a 29-year-old Zimbabwean man, Duncan Danda was jailed for 6 years by a South African magistrate for opening an illegal office at that country’s component of the border.
He was arrested at his base within the border taxi rank by the specialised crime unit, The Hawks and was convicted on two counts of contravening a section of the Immigration Act.
In the first count, Danda was sentenced to 6 years imprisonment which was set aside for five years, and he was fined R10 000 for the second count.-@tupeyo
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