The business entity, that was allegedly used for orchestrating and conspiring for utilisation in the Eastern Province Rugby Union fraudulent activities, was summoned to appear in the Gqeberha Specialised Commercial Crime Court on 05 November 2021 for allegations of fraud, money laundering, corruption, forgery and uttering.

It is alleged that on 12 December 2019, the entity conspired to defraud the Eastern Province Rugby Union by submitting two fraudulent invoices to the value of R457 000 for services that were not rendered. One was for Sports field hire in Cradock and the other one was for catering services for games that never took place. No supporting documents were submitted with these invoices and various irregularities were discovered upon scrutiny of the invoices.

John Scheepers (42), Elridge Februarie (48) and Jonny Oersen (37) were employees of the union while Bantwini Mateka (51) and Xoliswa Mbengu (48) were the clients who allegedly submitted fictitious invoices.

The legal entity is the registered company of whom Mbengu is the director that was allegedly used for siphoning the funds from the Rugby Union’s coffers. Mbengu and the other four accused have already appeared in court and were released on warning.

Source: South African Police Service