Correspondent|Former Zimbabwe Revenue Authority (ZIMRA) commissioner, Gershem Pasi who was on Thursday hauled before the court on allegations of criminal abuse of office told the court that he cannot afford the $5 000 bail that he had been ordered to pay.
ZIMRA was prejudiced of over $10 million as a result of Pasi’s alleged financial shenanigans.
Pasi who is being represented Farai Mushoriwa and Innocent Chingarande said he was unemployed and could not afford the proposed $5 000 bail as it was actually his daughter who was paying for him.
The State led by Veneranda Munyoro did not oppose bail.
Bail was not opposed on condition that he deposited $5 000 with the clerk of court and also surrender surety worth $200 000 in movable property, report twice a week at Borrowdale Police Station, surrender his passport and not to interfere with State witness Tendai Nyamarwe.
The defence however pleaded with the court to make a downward variation of the the bail conditions indicating that Pasi was unemployed and unable to raise the bail money .
They argued that it was his daughter who was going to pay for him.
Through his lawyers, Pasi indicated that he could only raise $2 000 and that he could also not hand over title deeds for any of his properties as surety as he had submitted them as mortgage bonds at CBZ Bank.
The State however argued that it had considered the status of Pasi during bail consideration and that they had come up with demands since they were State’s security and assurance that he will stand trial.
Pasi then offered to surrender his car, a Mercedes Benz S series which he said was valued at over $150 000.
Magistrate Mishrod Guvamombe however made a ruling to the effect that Pasi deposits $2 000 bail, provide surety of movable properties worth $150 000 coupled with other conditions given by the State.
Guvamombe then advised the defence council to make an independent application and liaise with the State for valuation of the car.
The court heard that in January 2014, the Chief Secretary to the President and Cabinet Misheck Sibanda led a high powered delegation of senior officials to China.
The purpose of the visit was to affirm input capabilities in the Information Technologies domain in implementing prioritised e-government projects.
Pasi was part of the delegation as they wanted to implement e-taxation at ZIMRA.
During the visit, various government departments had an opportunity to interact with personnel from a company called Inspur who demonstrated the capabilities.
An action plan for the implementation of the agreed programme was also signed and Pasi began his engagement with Inspur Zimbabwe for the Information Management Systems (IMS) design and development.
Pasi went on to form a committee at ZIMRA for designing the system and also drawing specifications of the project to be supplied.
ICT department being headed by Tyiyapo Velempini was involved in the designing of the system together with engineers from Inspur Global.
Inspur Global had a local office registered in Zimbabwe with resident personnel who were responsible for the implementation of the project.
In June 2014, ZIMRA and Inspur agreed on specifications and Pasi did not seek a direct quotation from Inspur Zimbabwe.
Instead, Pasi took the system design to Righlus Services , a company distributing Inspur products though the Office of the President and Cabinet (OPC) had not authorised a direct engagement.
Righlus Services ownership immediately changed during the engagement and a certain Tendai Maxwell Nyamarapo assumed a directorship position at Righlus services and owned one percent of the issued shares.
It emerged that Nyamarapo was a driver at ZIMRA ICT department and had resigned soon after Pasi engaged Righlus Services.
On July 1 2014, Righlus Services supplied the specifications to the tune of $33 million which it purported to be from Inspur Group of China.
Pasi in turn used that the quotation obtained from Righlus Services.
It is the State’s case that Pasi allegedly wrote to the OPC seeking authority to engage the State Procurement Board (SPB) for a direct purchase from Inspur for the supply, delivery and installation of the IMS.
Acting on Pasi’s request, the court heard that on September 2 of the same year, the SPB acceded to the direct engagement of Inspur Group of China for the supply, delivery and installation of hardware, equipment and software for the Tax Management System (e-taxation).
Pasi went on to sign a $32 649 939. 97 contract with Righlus Services which reflected that the company was to supply, deliver, install and commission the e-taxation system at ZIMRA, the court heard.
However, the contract was not a direct engagement with Inspur as duly authorised.
Through its parent company, Righlus signed a $11 819 000 contract with Inspur Global for the supply, delivery and installation of hardware, equipment software e-taxation system which was actually designed by Inspur Zimbabwe and ZIMRA ICT personnel and had been given direct engagement.
Inspur directly supplied the IMS system to ZIMRA and Righlus Services acted as a mere intermediary yet the work was done by personnel within the country.
ZIMRA paid $23 763 780.65 to Righlus Services instead of $11 819 000 if Pasi had not acted as he did.
M&T