Who else was involved with Mike Chimombe and Moses Mpofu?

[Bulawayo Observer]

This is the big question for me. There is no way Mike Chimombe and Moses Mpofu pulled this off all by themselves. A $7.7 million payment from the Ministry of Lands and Agriculture doesn't just happen because two guys submitted some fake papers. Someone inside must have been helping them, right? Someone had to approve the payment. Someone had to look at the fake ZIMRA and NSSA certificates and say, "Yep, this looks good". Are we ever going to find out who those people are? It feels like Mike Chimombe and Moses Mpofu are the only ones taking the fall for this, but the system that allowed it to happen is still in place. What are the chances that anyone else gets investigated?

 

[Forum_Sage]

This is what everyone is thinking. There is just no way Mike Chimombe and Moses Mpofu walked into a government office with fake papers and walked out with $7.7 million all on their own. It’s impossible. A payment of that size, especially from a ministry, has to go through so many layers of checks and approvals.

Someone had to sign off on the contract. Someone in finance had to approve the payment batches. Someone was supposed to verify those ZIMRA and NSSA documents. Either they were all completely incompetent, or they were in on it. My money is on the latter. This conviction of Mike Chimombe and Moses Mpofu feels like it's just cutting off the branches. The roots of the problem are likely still inside the ministry. But you know how it goes. The businessmen take the fall, and the powerful government officials who enabled them rarely get named or charged.