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Top cop sucked into CIO stocktheft scandal

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POLICE Deputy Commissioner-General Levy Sibanda has allegedly been sucked into a stock theft scandal involving five cattle stolen from Peggy Chipendo who works in the Office of the President in Chinhoyi.

POLICE Deputy Commissioner-General Levy Sibanda has allegedly been sucked into a stock theft scandal involving five cattle stolen from Peggy Chipendo who works in the Office of the President in Chinhoyi.

BY NUNURAI JENA

According to police documents shown to NewsDay, Chipendo’s farm worker Kainos Chapfura on September 17 last year reported a stocktheft case at Mhangura Police Station under case number CR 27/10/14, but investigations into the matter yielded nothing.

On January 7 this year, a junior police officer, only identified as Constable Madzivanzira based at Mhangura Police Station, reportedly cleared the same beasts and indicated that they were destined for ZRP Morris Depot. It, however, emerged that the beasts had been stolen by Samuel Hwema and sold to Sibanda through his farm manager identified as Ndaradzi Mudzverengi.

Madzivanzira cleared the livestock without the required proof of a stock clearance card. Police sources said sometime in February this year, Chipendo got information that four of her beasts had been slaughtered and taken to Sibanda’s Redwing Farm in Mhangura , but the fifth beast was recovered at Hwema’s nearby farm.

“What is of grave concern is that investigations revealed that the beasts were slaughtered without being inspected by health officials and put all those who consumed them at health risk,” a source involved in the investigations said.

Sibanda was allegedly sucked into the issue after Hwema, who is currently in custody over a different stocktheft charge, implicated him in the theft of Chipendo’s cattle.

But, chief police spokesperson Senior Assistant Commissioner Charity Charamba yesterday said: “What I am told is that he (Sibanda) is not involved in anyway, but his manager is the one who bought the cattle on behalf of his boss.”

Charamba also dismissed claims that Sibanda sold the meat to the staff canteen at Morris Depot in Harare. Sibanda once worked as provincial police chief for Mashonaland West Province before his transfer to Harare.