By Kudakwashe Vhenge
A Zimbabwe Republic Police (ZRP) Criminal Investigation Department (CID) officer has been arrested for accepting two residential stands as bribe from a land developer in Harare.
Thomas Mabgwe who is stationed at Police General Headquarters was on Wednesday denied bail by a Harare Magistrate.
He is being charged with bribery and criminal abuse of office.
It is the state’s case that sometime in September 2015, Mabgwe who was by then stationed at Police General Headquarters Police Intelligence and attached to Harare Magistrate Court as a Public Prosecutor received two residential stands valued USD 78 000 from Delatfin Civil Engineering (Pvt) Ltd.
The engineering company was servicing residential stands at Sandton Park and Hydon Farm in Harare and was involved in illegal selling of residential stands and double allocation of the same.
As a result a number of civil suits and criminal matters were being reported against the company and its Chief Executive Officer, Felix Munyaradzi.
In a bid to get protection against pending and future criminal cases, Felix Munyaradzi gave Thomas Mabgwe in his capacity as a public official two residential stands number 1718 and 1719 Sandton Park measuring 1717 square meters valued at USD$78 000.
During the investigations of the matter, police recovered copies of two agreements of sale dated 16 September 2015 signed between the Delatfin CEO Felix Munyaradzi in respect of the stands in question from the company’s offices.
Also recovered was a confirmation letter that the accused did not pay any land intrinsic price for both stands.
