|
| Home News | | EPA ‘looters’ finally dragged to court | FAUSTINE KAPAMA
Daily News; Thursday,November 06, 2008 @10:01
| Well known tycoon Jayantkumar Chandubhai Patel, alias Jeetu Patel, and nine others were charged with stealing over 31bn/-, property of the Bank of Tanzania (BoT) linked with the External Payments Arrears (EPA) accounts.
They were also charged with conspiracy, forgery and alternative count of obtaining credit by false pretences. All ten were arraigned to court the same day - but in separate appearances and before different magistrates – where they all denied the charges.
The accused were remanded until today when the court would rule on their bail applications in some cases, or determination on whether they would meet the set bail conditions in other cases. The accused are facing a total of six different cases.
The other accused are Devendra Vinodbhai Patel, Amit Nandy, Ketan Chohan, Johnson Mutachukurwa Lukaza, Bahati Mahenge, Manase Mwakale, Davis Kamungu, Godfrey Mosha and the lone woman, Eddah Mwakale. Seven prosecutors are prosecuting the cases: they include Principal State Attorneys Winfrida Kasoro and Stanslaus Boniface;
Senior State Attorney Frederick Nakulilo and State Attorneys Biswalo Mganga; Daud Momburu, Edgar Luoga, Ephraim Sedekia and Assistant Assistant Commissioner of Police Charles Kenyela. The prosecution did not object to any bail but only requested that the court be guided by provisions of Section 148 (5) (e) of the Criminal Procedure Act when setting out bail conditions.
One such provision requires that an accused person facing a charge involving money exceeding 10m/- to deposit in court half of the money alleged to have been stolen, or to surrender a title deed of immovable property whose market value is equivalent to the said value.
The defence comprising advocates Alex Mgongolwa, Mpaya Kamala, Martin Matunda and Mabere Marando did not object to the prosecution’s request, but pointed out that the court should consider the accused’s presumption of innocence and their right of liberty.
They submitted that the accused have been all along cooperating with the presidential committee formed to probe the matter and were given police bail and did not at any point in time fail to respond to summons when so required. However, some of the magistrates who delivered their rulings ordered the two Patels, Nandy, Chohan and Lukaza to deposit in court half the amount of money they are alleged to have stolen and secure two sureties who would sign bonds of similar amounts.
The said accused were also ordered to surrender their passports or any travel document, not to leave the city without obtaining court permission and were directed to report to the office of the prosecutor-in-charge every Friday of the end of every calendar month.
It is alleged that Jeetu, Chohan and Nandy conspired between August 26 and October 27, 2005 and later stole 3,323,974,942/30, while Chodan alone was charged with uttering and forging a deed of assignment between Navy Cut Tobacco Limited and Matsushita Electric Trading Company of Japan.
Chodan, according to the prosecution, purportedly showed that the NAAVY Cut Company had been assigned a debt of the said amount by Matsushita Company in consideration for value received. The prosecution alleged that Jeetu Patel, Devendra K. Vinodbhai Patel and Amit Nandy conspired between August 9 and December 7, 2005 and stole 10,562,922,828/-, while Nandy alone was charged with forging and uttering to the BoT a deed of assignment between Bencon International Limited and Matshushita Company and another between Bencon Company and Marubeni Corporation.
He allegedly purported to show that Bencon Company had assigned a debt of the said amount by Matsushita and Marubeni Companies in considerations for value received. The three accused were also charged with conspiring between August 30 and October 27, 2006 and stealing 4,924,494,477/-, while Jeetu and Patel (Vinodbhai) allegedly forged a deed of assignment of the said amount between Maltan Mining Company Limited of Tanzania and Marubeni Company of Japan.
Jeetu, Patel, Nandy and Chohan were also charged with conspiring between May 30 and September, 2006 of stealing 3,924,992,009/-, while Chohan was charged alone with forging a deed of assignment between Bina Resorts Limited and C. ITOH and Company Limited of Japan.
He allegedly uttered the document to the BoT purporting to show that Bina Company had assigned a debt of the said amount by the C. ITOH Company in consideration for value received. Between December 2003 and December 2005, Lukaza allegedly conspired with other people and stole 6,300,402,224/-, while Mahenge, Kamungu, Mosha and Mwakale allegedly conspired between December 23 and October 2005 and allegedly stole 2,041,899,876/-. | | View Visitor's comments on this Story
| | |
|
|
|
| |
| COMMENTS ON THE STORY |
| Mijibwa, wa mijibwa | | bark@yahoo.com | |
| Asya, Hija | | chiya13@hotmail.com | |
|
|
| |
|
| |
|
|
