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FOUR illegal currency dealers have appeared in court on allegations of defrauding four people of ZiG 223 000 in a botched foreign currency deal.
Rumbidzai Tsongora (24), Tranos Taurai Muzanenhamo (26), Timothy Bvuramiti (27) and Brawell Shangwa were facing fraud charges when they appeared before Harare magistrate Mr Simon Kandiyero on Thursday. They were remanded in custody to Monday for bail application.
The court heard that on July 9, 2024, Tsongora and Muzanenhamo went to an Econet agent in Marondera, Tsitsi Munganasa, where Tsongora presented a national identity card falsely identifying her as Ruth Machakadya. She allegedly replaced a SIM card belonging to Machakadya. After replacing the SIM card, Tsongora allegedly handed it over to Muzanenhamo to download the WhatsApp application and registered it in the name of Machakadya.
Muzanenhamo accessed Machakadya’s contacts and allegedly advertised on various WhatsApp groups that he had US$5 000 to exchange with local currency through bank transfers. Three complainants — Edith Serina Makona, Tinashe Kativhu and Obedience Kapisavanhu — all from Harare , expressed interest in transacting with the accused.
The complainants transferred ZiG68 000, ZiG65 000 and ZiG 90 000 respectively into a bank account belonging to Goods Carrier Services Private Limited on the instructions of Muzanenhamo. Bvuramiti was allegedly responsible for using the stolen funds to get hard currency from street money changer Aaron Gidi, while Shangwa was allegedly responsible for fraudulently harvesting details of would-be victims. The details would be kept in a diary which was recovered from his room on his arrest.
The court heard that on July 16, police received a tip off on the whereabouts of the accused persons who had sought refuge at a house in Chitungwiza. Police detectives searched the house, leading to the recovery of 30 unused Econet SIM cards, 36 Econet SIM cards, 25 unused NetOne SIM cards, four used NetOne SIM cards, four Telecel SIM cards, and five Omari bank credit cards.
It was established that the accused were not employed by the network providers and planned to use the recovered items to commit fraud. The court heard police also recovered a Toyota Hiace which was allegedly bought using the stolen money. (The Herald)
Bongani Ndlovu