Scorpions won’t seize Kuruneri’s properties (31-07-07)

.

A Harare High Court judge Justice Susan Mavangira acquitted Kuruneri
last Friday after a high profile three-year trial following an exposé in the
South African Sunday Times newspaper that he had built a R30 million
mansion in Cape Town’s exclusive seaside suburb of Llandudno.

SA’s Asset Forfeiture Unit had indicated that it was going to impound
Kuruneri’s home on allegations that it was obtained by ill-gotten
wealth. But the Scorpions have indicated there is no need to pursue the case
since Kuruneri’s innocence has been proven in court.

Zimbabwe’s Attorney General also indicated that there was no need to
pursue his properties as well. After just three months at the helm of
Zimbabwe’s ailing economy, Kuruneri,
57, became the first member of cabinet to be arrested in a clampdown on
corruption. Mugabe detained the minister for a record 15 months using
sinister regulations that denied the right to bail to suspects. He was
later put on house arrest for more than a year after being denied bail eight
times.
Kuruneri’s attorney lawyer Bruce Mujeri told The Zimbabwean his client
was “elated” at his acquittal and “thankful to his family, his friends and
all the people who supported him during the torrid three years.”
“He is enjoying his freedom,” Mujeri said.

From the time of his arrest, Kuruneri protested his innocence. The
house, which he was accused of buying for R30 million, had cost only R7
million, he argued.
He maintained that he paid for it with foreign currency earned abroad
as a consultant, which he had no obligation to repatriate; that as an
investor he was entitled to invest anywhere in anything that brought financial
reward; and that as a lawyer he knew the Foreign Exchange Control Act well and
had not contravened its provisions.
Kuruneri has also denied having two passports, saying that he once
lived as a permanent resident in Canada but did not become a citizen.
He was due to appear before Justice Mavangira in the High Court yesterday for the
citizenship case trial.
There have been suggestions that the anti-corruption drive was mostly
aimed at ensuring Mugabe’s political survival, both by winning support among
a disapproving public and by getting rid of political leaders he saw
either as a threat or an embarrassment.

In pointed remarks during the 2005 Independence Day celebrations,
Mugabe said: “Millions (in) foreign currency have been externalised through a
variety of fraudulent activities practised by highly placed people we
had trusted to manage our economy….these fraudulent and thoroughly
dishonest people are the real enemies of our country… their permanent home is
the prison.”
Kuruneri was facing charges of externalising US$1 million, £300,000
pound sterling and R300,000. A team of detectives was dispatched to South
Africa to probe his transactions there. But his story is not any perculiar.
Such stories about the rich and powerful have become commonplace in
Zimbabwe in the past decade, but it was only in 2004 that Mugabe seriously
struck out against graft, especially money laundering, illegal currency dealing
and gold smuggling. Corruption has been speeding the collapse of an economy
that has shrunk almost 60 percent in the past seven years and is reeling
under nearly 5,000 percent inflation.
In recent years there has been a rampant growth in graft, and the
sudden appearance of ostentatiously rich people in or connected to Zanu (PF),
with luxury cars and homes bought with corrupt earnings. This has infuriated
the public and embarrassed Mugabe.