Man in court over botched forex deal

Michael Mashiri

A Tynwald man appeared Harare Magistrates' Court, charged with defrauding a vendor, claiming that he wanted RTGS in exchange for United States dollars.

However, when his account was credited with the RTGS, he disappeared without giving the vendor, Sofa Teurai, the United States dollars equivalent.

Teurai works in the Central Business District as a vendor.

Gerald Pondai, 30, of Tynwald North in Harare was accused of fraud, violating Section 136 of the Criminal Law Codification and Reform Act, Chapter 9:23.

He appeared before magistrate Dennis Mangosi who placed him on remand to February 1, 2023, pending trial.

Pondai, who is self-employed as a telecoms engineer, on March 3, 2022, reportedly approached Teurai and lied to her that he had United States dollars and he wanted to pay his employees in RTGS.

He told Teurai that the cash was in his office and would go and collect it after Taurai had deposited the ZWL$10 000 000.

Teurai deposited ZWL$10 000 000 into Pondai’s CBZ account and after that he became evasive.

He went on to withdraw the money without giving Teurai the United States dollars as he had promised.

This resulted in Teurai losing ZWL$10 000 000 and nothing was recovered.