Staff Reporter
LEAKED information in the ongoing Government Institutions Pension Fund (GIPF) fraud case has revealed the names of orphans which were cheated of their monthly payments and that these payments which exceed over N$17 million involved transfers to 46 bank accounts.
The employees which are implicated in the case are Vabiola Aoses and Martin Eugene Smith and although the incident involves over 40 bank accounts, to date, the Prosecutor General has only frozen two bank accounts of Smith which contained over N$5 million. The two employees have been denied bail and are due to appear in court again on 8 November.
In a sworn affidavit, Ignatius Manyando Manyando, the manager of Annuities explained that on 6 July 2022 the Annuity Division received an enquiry from Otjiwarongo Regional Office in respect of a child annuitant named Jessica R. Gowases who claimed that she did not receive her children’s pension for the 2019 school calendar.
“The Otjiwarongo office was approached by a certain Jessica Gowases, who enquired about her monthly benefit which had stopped. As a requirement the Fund suspends annuities if proof of life or proof of studies have not been received. Upon quick investigation we discovered that her payments were indeed paid and up to date but shockingly it was paid to a different account not belonging to her,” Manyando said.
He added that on 10 August 2022 the Fund uncovered a host of other fraudulent incidents in which payments were made to several accounts which do not belong to members the Fund is supposed to be paying monthly.
“At this stage the Fund has uncovered that, illegal payments were made through Bank Windhoek, Standard Bank, and First National bank (FNB) and this involves 46 bank accounts,” Manyando said.
He concluded that the investigation to establish the full extent of the loss is ongoing, however the preliminary findings point to about N$17 703 477.10.
