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Fidelis Munyoro, Chief Court Reporter
The much-anticipated trial of business partners Moses Mpofu and Mike Chimombe, initially scheduled to resume today at the High Court, has been postponed to February 20 after a bereavement in the family of one of the defence lawyers.
Chimombe’s lawyer Advocate Tapson Dzvetero’s is attending a funeral following a bereavement in his family, prompting Justice Pisirayi Kwenda to grant the postponement.
Mpofu and Chimombe stand accused of misappropriating millions of dollars from the Presidential Goat Pass-On Scheme, a case that has captured national attention as one of the country’s most prominent corruption scandals.
Their legal battles have been protracted, with repeated attempts to suspend the trial on grounds of alleged constitutional violations proving unsuccessful.
Last month, their latest bid for bail was denied by Justice Kwenda, who raised critical concerns about the risk of flight.
The court noted that the gravity of the charges, coupled with the potential 20-year prison sentence hanging over the accused, significantly heightened the likelihood of absconding.
The charges against the duo are rooted in allegations of forgery and fraud, involving the falsification of ZIMRA and NSSA compliance certificates under the name of Blackdeck Private Limited.
The fraudulent documents were allegedly submitted as part of a tender bid to the Ministry of Lands, Agriculture, Water, Fisheries, and Rural Development for the supply and delivery of goats under the scheme.
Investigations later uncovered damning evidence, the QR code and reference on the NSSA compliance certificate belonged to an entirely different entity, while Blackdeck (Pvt) Ltd had been deregistered from the NSSA system as far back as January 2016.
Online Reporter