Council acting finance director in court

By Nyore Madzianike

Harare City Council acting finance director Stanley Ndemera yesterday appeared at the Harare Magistrates Court on allegations of double allocation of a stand in Harare’s Vainona low density suburb.

Ndemera is alleged to have allocated stand 409 Vainona Township to Hardspec Investment (Pvt) Limited for $26 923 340 before selling it to Mt Pleasant Sports Club for US$2,3 million.

He was not asked to plead to charges of criminal abuse of office when he appeared before regional magistrate Mr Stanford Mambanje. Mr Mambanje freed Ndemera on $20 000 bail and ordered him to return to court on April 9.

The State led by Mrs Tinashe Makiya alleges that on September 4, 2019, Ndemera offered Hardspec Investment the piece of land and also extended the same offer to Mt Pleasant Sports Club, which had a running lease of 30 years.

It is alleged that Ndemera gave Mt Pleasant Sports Club two days to accept and pay for the piece of land.

The offer letter was delivered to Mt Pleasant Sports Club on September 5 with the following day being the due date.

Mrs Makiya further alleges that before Mt Pleasant Sports Club responded after receiving the offer letter on September 5, 2019, Ndemera wrote a report to the council’s finance committee recommending that the same piece of land be sold to Hardspec Investments.

The report was said to have been acceded to under item four of the finance and development minutes dated September 5, 2019.

It is said the report was adopted in the full council meeting on the same date.

Mt Pleasant Spots Club on September 5, 2019 also approached Ndemera expressing interest in purchasing the piece of land and asked for extension of time to pay for the stand since they could not afford to raise the US$2,3 million within 24 hours.

The court heard that Hardspec Investment paid $6 923 340 to council towards the purchase of the stand way after the lapse of due date with the final agreement having been made on March 27, 2020.

Ndemera is alleged to have abused his office by showing favour to Hardspec Investments by allowing it to purchase the piece of land in local currency ahead of Mt Pleasant Sports Club. The Herald