A BANCABC teller, accused of swindling his employer of $55 000, had his application for discharge dismissed by Bulawayo magistrate Sithembiso Ncube at the close of the State case on Tuesday.
BY SILAS NKALA
Hlonipani Ngwenya (33) had applied for discharge, arguing he had no case to answer, but the court quashed his freedom bid and remanded the matter to May 30 for continuation of trial.
The State alleges that on October 17 last year, Ngwenya was allocated a day’s float of $80 000 from the vault by his supervisor, Derrick Phiri and received R10 540 as deposits from various clients.
The bank’s operations team later carried out an end of day check on all tellers and allegedly discovered that Ngwenya had made false entries in the system, culminating in a further probe.
Investigations established that Ngwenya could not account for $55 000 and R10 540.
In his defence, Ngwenya said the charges were baseless and unproven, adding that on the day in question his financial records had been confirmed and endorsed by the bank’s operations manager.
He also denied receiving R10 500 as alleged, insisting he entered four transactions comprising of $80 000 from the vault, two transactions of $55 000 and $30 000 to the vault and $15 000 to a fellow teller.
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“The entries were raised and the transactions were authorised,” Ngwenya submitted.
He said at the end of the day, the operations manager took the balance sheets and later came back claiming that the accounts had a shortfall of $55 000.
The bank was represented by branch operations team leader, Tigere Maswera and lawyer, Bruce Masamvu.
