MOPANI – A senior nurse at the Dr CN Phathudi Hospital, Poony Modiba (43), and a 36-year-old woman, Maiti Elisa Malesa, briefly appeared in the Maake Magistrate's Court on a charge corruption last Friday.

According to the spokesperson of the police in the Mopani area, Insp Hasani Mabaso, the incidents relating to the case occurred between January and August this year.

The statement indicates that during the said period, Modiba allegedly defrauded the government of a huge amount of money. In the statement, the police indicated that Modiba charged members of the public anything above R700 in order for her to complete disability grant forms for them.

The people who were requested to pay the money, in exchange for the completed forms, consequently qualified for disability grants, as they were declared to have some form of permanent disability in the falsified forms. The fraudulent transactions have, according to the police statement, resulted in many normal people qualifying for disability grants, thus defrauding the government of a huge amount of money.

The statement indicates that Modiba hired Malesa to work as her agent to recruit more clients, after realizing that she was generating a lot of income from her illegal business. The scam came under the spotlight after the police were tipped off about Mobida's "self-enrichment scheme".

Modiba and Malesa were arrested some days before their court appearance. They were not asked to plead and the case was postponed to October 30. The police have appealed to the people who fell victim to the scheme to avail themselves at the Maake Police Station, or phone the police at Tel 015-3558355/6/7 or 0723508358.