2 Zinara officials bypass system, install own ‘gates’

Yeukai Karengezeka Court Correspondent
TWO Zimbabwe National Road Administration (Zinara) revenue clerks yesterday appeared in court for allegedly installing a boom override system illegally and collecting money for their personal use.
Tariro Mhuka (26) and Henderson Msowa (39) appeared before Harare regional magistrate Mrs Marehwanazvo Gofa facing fraud charges.
They were granted US$200 bail each and remanded to November 30.
Zinara is the complainant, represented by its risk and loss control manager, Mr Tawanda Marenga.
The two were operating from Zinara’s Eskbank Tollgate along the Harare-Bindura highway.
Some of their duties included collection of revenue from the motoring public and remitting the collected revenue to the senior revenue clerk at the close of business.
Prosecuting, Mr Pardon Dziva alleged that on July 18, the two connived to steal from Zinara using a 10-10 Technologies (Private) Limited information system.
The company, 10-10 Technologies, is the system provider for Zinara.
Mhuka and Msowa were allegedly working together with other Zinara employees, who have since been arrested and arraigned before the court.
Others are still at large.
It is understood that after the installation of the illegal system that would bypass the normal operating system, the suspects collectively received tolling funds from the motoring public, purporting that the funds would be channelled to Zinara, when in fact they would convert the funds to their own use.
The court heard on July 20, the Zinara risk and loss control department discovered the offence through CCTV footage, prompting them to report the matter to the police.
Investigations were instituted and it was established that the boom override installations were fitted without the knowledge and consent of Zinara and also without the knowledge of 10-10 Technologies.
On July 26, a team from CID Commercial Crimes went to 10-10 Technologies and they confirmed that they had not authorised the installation of the boom override system at the Eskbank Tollgate.
The State also has CCTV footage showing Mhuka and Msowa committing the crime.
Zinara is yet to establish the total prejudice, and so far, nothing has been recovered.

The association of companies providing services to the Angolan oil industry (AECIPA) on Wednesday rejected the idea that Angola is experiencing an energy crisis, saying that the country has “many reserves and infrastructures that allow for efficient production”.

“At Angolan level we are not in an energy crisis, we are in a process of transition, our oil industry is in a certain way mature, there are almost 50 years of oil production,” said the president of AECIPA, Bráulio de Brito.

According to the official, who was speaking at the 3rd Environment and Development Conference, Angola is producing at the limit of its capacity and has “a lot of oil reserves”.

“Our infrastructures are such that our daily production can be higher than we see today, there is work to be done to make this happen, so we will continue and the operators have the strength to make this happen. We, the service providers, are here to help,” he emphasised.

For the chairman of AECIPA, who was one of the speakers at the round table on the “Energy Crisis, the Extractive Sector and the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)”, there is still a way to go, but the country does not have an energy crisis as such, he insisted.

He argued that Angola needs to produce more oil efficiently and cleanly, so that “really,” he noted, the benefits of the revenues generated can be channelled into the country’s social development.

“And so that these revenues can be transformed so that Angola can be independent of oil, so that oil is another pillar of our economy and not the pillar of our economy,” he pointed out.

The chairman of AECIPA also pointed to the need for the country to continue to maintain the oil industry as the “engine for the transition to economic diversification,” admitting, however, that Angola “is not yet ready to live without oil.

“What we have to do is continue to reinforce all the good that the oil industry offers in terms of financial income, in terms of being able to produce with less impact on the environment, with very strong ecological development,” he emphasised.

The leader of the association of service providers in the oil sector in Angola also stressed the importance of the sector being aligned with the SDGs, so that production is more efficient and has less impact on the environment.

Asked during the debate about the participation of AECIPA members in the sector’s technological transformation, Bráulio de Brito said that the sector’s value chain is supported by service providers and they are the driving force behind the technological transition.

The operators “have their role to play, but on the other side of the value chain, we are the ones who carry out the service and we, the service providers, end up being the driving force behind the transition to technological transformation,” he argued.

“Because we’re the ones who really have to use these technologies so that operators can operate and coordinate production processes efficiently with less damage to the environment,” he concluded.

“The Impact of the SDGs on Business” was the motto of the 3rd Environment and Development Conference held today in Luanda by Economia & Mercado magazine.

Angola is the second largest oil producer in sub-Saharan Africa after Nigeria.