Conman swindles 20 civil servants
About 20 civil servants are in a state of bafflement after the Accountant General made loan deductions from their salaries this month when they had not borrowed any money.
The civil servants, who have so far lodged complaints with the lending institution, Get Bucks, and the Malawi Police Service (MPS), are from Plant and Vehicle Hire Organisation (PVHO), the Judiciary, and Ministry of Information, Tourism and Culture.
Our investigations indicate that a conman allegedly obtained pay slips of the civil servants then produced an identity document, usually a voter’s certificate, which he then used to obtain a loan.
In one case, the name of the civil servant as it appeared on the payslip was misspelled on the ID, but the conman managed to obtain the loan.
One of the victims, who opted for anonymity, said he was surprised to find that his payslip showed a loan deduction last month.
Said the victim: “Someone got a loan using my payslip of April last year and I experienced my first deductions last month.”
Lilongwe Police Station deputy spokesperson Kingsley Dandaula confirmed that one person, Dave Ngalande, 37, was granted bail last week in connection with the theft.
He said some of Ngalande’s alleged victims include PVHO and Judiciary employees from Blantyre.
The increasing reports of civil servants distancing themselves from the loans prompted the Department of Human Resource Management and Development (DHRMD) to report to police for further investigations.
Ngalande has since been charged with forgery contrary to Section 356 of the Penal Code, uttering a false document contrary to Section 360 of the Penal Code and obtaining money by false pretence.
The suspect will appear in court in February for hearing. n
This story has been poorly written. I would have thought you could could have linked Get Bucks to this Ngalande chap but the tow are way far apart. It leaves us readers to wonder “does it ,mean Ngalande was connected to Get Bucks?” Furthermore, the way the civil servants were conned is not properly explained. How did he get the payslips in the first place? Did he know them before? How can one just surrender a payslip to a person you don’t know? I do not know if Suzgo Khunga has an editor at all. Poor writing skills here. Take a refresher at MIJ.
I think Wailing Soul is right, there are a lot of unanswered questions here. Of course I know that among civil servants, payslips are not as sacred a piece of paper as guys treat them in the private sector, there they are left on working tables for all who care to see, so Ngalande might have been working with some civil servants to collect their colleagues’idle payslips and take them to Get Bucks for quick loans. This is a lesson to both the civil servants to start keeping their payslips safe and Get Bucks to verify their clients’ authenticity before giving them loans. I know these microloan sharks want to outdoor each other in ease of getting a loan index, if one really existed and in so doing have becoming less scrutinising of their applicants