The Johannesburg Specialised Commercial Crimes Court, sitting in Palm Ridge sentenced bookkeeper Gumede, to 135 years, for theft of the Covid-19 Temporary Employer/Employee Relief Scheme (TERS) Fund. Some of the sentences were ordered to run concurrently, resulting in 20 years of direct imprisonment. According to NPA spokesperson Phindi Mjonondwane, Gumede was convicted on 32 counts of theft, to the tune of more than R11 million, by creating and submitting applications for employees on the Covid19Ters system, purporting, in a form of Comma-Separated Values (CSV) files, that they were employed by companies that he rendered bookkeeping services for.
They included Country pies, LPG Clotilda (Pty) Ltd, Odonus Investments (Pty) Ltd and La Mela (Pty) Ltd. “This, even though these entities never submitted applications for temporary relief funds to the Department of Labour.” The state of National Disaster was declared by the South African Government on the 26th of March 2020 due to the Corona Virus Pandemic of 2019 (COVID-19). The National Lockdown that ensued meant that businesses stopped operating and people stopped pursuing their livelihoods which impacted their income. In response to the National Lockdown, the South African Government, through the Department of Labour, set up the TERS for 5 months to assist employers by paying a limited portion of employees’ salaries where the employer had to close operations (completely/or partially) due to the National Lockdown and/or linked with the Covid 19 pandemic.
Employers, registered with the Unemployment Insurance Fund (UIF), were required to make applications on behalf of their employees to the Department of Labour. These benefits would then be paid directly to the Employer who would then pay the employee(s). Pleading with the court not to deviate from imposing the minimum prescribed sentence, Senior State Adv. Frans Mhlongo argued that the TERS benefit was a direct response by the Government to the economic effects of the Covid-19 pandemic. The looting of these coffers diverted money for much-needed assistance away from destitute citizens and worthy projects.
“The public need to know that there are consequences for misappropriation and abuse of public coffers.” Mhlongo Phindi said NPA applauded the investigating officer, Warrant Officer, Thamsanqa Kraai and Adv Mhlongo for securing a sentence, that serves to teach the public that those days of abusing and misappropriating public coffers are over. “There will be dire consequences for perpetrators of such offences,” she warned.
