PG still to decide on death claims fraud case

THREE-AND-A-HALF years after the first arrests were carried out over an alleged N$7,3 million fraud scheme involving Ministry of Defence death benefit pay-outs, the Prosecutor General has still not decided what to do with the case, suspects in the matter were told yesterday.

In the latest of a long succession of appearances in the Windhoek Magistrate’s Court, a former Defence Ministry personnel officer, Emmanuel Kapumba Mununga, and his co-accused were told that a decision from the PG on the further course their case would be taking was still not available. The PG has to decide on what charges the suspects would be prosecuted and in which court they will have to stand trial.The result was that Magistrate Claudia Claasen postponed their case once more, to September 1, for the PG’s decision to be made and provided to them by then.Defence counsel appearing for some of the 24 people accused in the case protested the prospect of yet another delay in the case before it was postponed yesterday.Public Prosecutor Christopher Stanley responded, though, that the 24 had pleaded to the charges against them only in February – they all pleaded not guilty – and that the case was postponed for the PG’s decision to be taken only then.The case against Mununga and his co-accused has already had to be withdrawn once, in May 2002, when defence lawyers in the matter objected against another postponement because of the prosecution then not being ready to put the charges to the accused.At that stage Mununga had been released on bail of N$50 000.Most of his co-accused had been freed on bail of N$10 000 each.With the withdrawal of the case, the suspects’ bail money was returned to them, but they were however again summoned to return to court on the same charges.They have been free on a warning from the court since then.Mununga and the first of his co-accused were arrested in mid-December 2000.The 24 are accused of having been part of a fraud scheme in which Mununga allegedly helped process false claims for life assurance pay-outs for Namibia Defence Force members who were claimed to have died, when in fact, it is charged, they were still alive and well.Sanlam Namibia is alleged to have been misled into making N$7,362 million in such fraudulently claimed death benefits pay-outs, with Mununga accused of having channelled the proceeds from the scheme through bank accounts of his co-accused or of having used their names as the supposed beneficiaries of the life assurance policies for which pay-outs were made.The fraud is alleged to have been committed between January 1997 and December 2000.The PG has to decide on what charges the suspects would be prosecuted and in which court they will have to stand trial.The result was that Magistrate Claudia Claasen postponed their case once more, to September 1, for the PG’s decision to be made and provided to them by then.Defence counsel appearing for some of the 24 people accused in the case protested the prospect of yet another delay in the case before it was postponed yesterday.Public Prosecutor Christopher Stanley responded, though, that the 24 had pleaded to the charges against them only in February – they all pleaded not guilty – and that the case was postponed for the PG’s decision to be taken only then.The case against Mununga and his co-accused has already had to be withdrawn once, in May 2002, when defence lawyers in the matter objected against another postponement because of the prosecution then not being ready to put the charges to the accused.At that stage Mununga had been released on bail of N$50 000.Most of his co-accused had been freed on bail of N$10 000 each.With the withdrawal of the case, the suspects’ bail money was returned to them, but they were however again summoned to return to court on the same charges.They have been free on a warning from the court since then.Mununga and the first of his co-accused were arrested in mid-December 2000.The 24 are accused of having been part of a fraud scheme in which Mununga allegedly helped process false claims for life assurance pay-outs for Namibia Defence Force members who were claimed to have died, when in fact, it is charged, they were still alive and well.Sanlam Namibia is alleged to have been misled into making N$7,362 million in such fraudulently claimed death benefits pay-outs, with Mununga accused of having channelled the proceeds from the scheme through bank accounts of his co-accused or of having used their names as the supposed beneficiaries of the life assurance policies for which pay-outs were made.The fraud is alleged to have been committed between January 1997 and December 2000.