South Africa
Ten senior Cogta officials released on bail─── 16:45 Fri, 22 Nov 2019
Ten senior officials from the department of cooperative governance who were arrested in connection with the Amathole municipality toilet corruption case, briefly appeared in the East London Magistrate's Court on Friday.
Nine of the officials were granted bail of R40,000 each, while bail was set at R10,000 for the tenth accused.
They have been charged with corruption, fraud and money laundering.
The group is expected to make their second appearance in February 5, 2020.
It's understood that one of the accused is the CEO of Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs’ (Cogta) Municipal Infrastructure Support Agent (MISA), Goodman Ntandazo Vimba.
His arrest follows that of African National Congress MP Bongani Bongo who was arrested on unrelated corruption charges. Bongo stands accused of trying to bribe the evidence leader in Parliament's probe into state capture at Eskom to suppress the inquiry.
Bongo appeared in the Cape Town Magistrates Court earlier on Thursday where he was released on R5,000 bail.
African News Agency (ANA)
