By Zweli Martin Dlamini

MBABANE:Chief Justice Bheki Maphalala was not arrested despite clear evidence suggesting that he defrauded Government over R1million in housing allowances, instead, documentation was secretly prepared where he committed to pay back only two hundred thousand Rands(R200,000.00).

The highly corrupt CJ was exposed by this Swaziland News Investigation Unit, he was benefiting fifteen thousand Rands(R15,000.00)every month as  housing allowance despite being allocated a house at the Judges Complex at Thembelihle, Mbabane.

Documents sourced from the Government payment system suggest that the CJ started paying back one hundred and ninety-six thousand, one hundred and thirty-two Rands, fifty-one cents(R196,132.51)with installments of three thousand, two hundred and sixty eight Rands, eighty-eight cents(R3,268.88).

Analyses of CJ Bheki Maphalala’s June 2022 pay-slip suggest that he started paying back the money on the same month and the housing allowance of R15,048.53 has been stopped.

It has been disclosed that the alleged defrauded ‘re-payment’ is recorded as “overpayment of salary” in the Government documents.

A government official who was working closely on the matter said after being exposed by this publication, the Chief Justice agreed to pay back the said amount even though it was far less than what he allegedly defrauded.

“He is paying back the R200,000.00 even though it is far less than what he allegedly defrauded. The problem here is that we don’t know the exact date when he started occupying the house, that’s why he agreed on this amount,” said the Government insider.

A questionnaire was sent to Chief Justice Bheki Maphalala, however, he had not responded at the time of compiling this report.

On another note, the documents suggest that Maphalala will pay the installments of R3,268.88 for a period of sixty(60)months and or five(5) years,it is not clear if he would still be the Chief Justice by that time.

Reached for comments,human rights Thulani Maseko,the Chairperson of the Multi-Stakeholder Forum said the criminal justice system was supposed to act on these serious allegations of fraud against the Chief Justice.

“Failure to do so, only means the integrity and dignity of the justice system is compromised.What you are talking about is only but one issue around the integrity of the Chief Justice, we know that even the Law Society has lots of complaints against the sitting Chief Justice. So we need to look at this in the context of all other issues around the conduct of the Chief Justice and whether or not, given these allegations, the Chief Justice is fit to continue occupying the seat as the Head of the Judiciary,” said the Chairperson of the Multi-Stakeholder Forum.