Senior Court Reporter
FORMER Africom Holdings (Private) Limited chief executive officer Kwanayi Kashangura and lawyer Muyengwa Enjurance Motsi were in court yesterday on allegations of stealing US$46 000 of Africom money held in trust funds in 2014.
Kashangura and Motsi denied the charges of theft of trust property when they appeared before Harare regional magistrate Mr Tinei Manwere, but blamed each other for the payment to a company owned by Kashangura.
Motsi said he simply obeyed Kashangura’s instructions while Kashangura argued that only Motsi could release money from his trust account. In his defence prepared by lawyer Professor Lovemore Madhuku, Kashangura told the court that he never received trust funds from Africom Holdings and never assumed joint responsibility on Motsi’s trust account, which was in the sole care of Motsi as a legal practitioner.
He argued that Motsi was, by law, solely responsible for his trust account.
The sum of US$171 000 referred to in the State outline was lawfully given to Motsi as trust property, he said, and Kashangura only authorised Motsi to make disbursements in accordance with the purposes for which the money was held in trust. Motsi in his defence told the court that Kashangura and another top manager at Africom Holdings Mrs Rudo Mudavanhu approached him in February 2014 looking for a transitory account to deposit conveyancing fees for Longcheng by Messrs Gambe and Partners.
Kashangura and Mudavanhu were still negotiating for…
