Vodacom Tanzania MD Rene Meza resigns over $350 million scandal

.Tenders resignation letter this morning
.Feared he may flee the country to avoid prosecution
.Sources reveal how Vodacom Tanzania MD met more than 10 times with Tanil Somaiya, Rostam .Aziz to negotiate $5 million kickback
.Vodacom corporate affairs chief issues cover-up statement that back-fires

VODACOM Tanzania’s Managing Director, Rene Meza, has resigned over the $350 million (over 675 billion shillings) scandal involving the sale of pirate mobile phone vouchers to Tanzanians.

Sources inside Vodacom South Africa headquarters in Johannesburg and Vodacom Tanzania in Dar es Salaam confirmed that Meza tendered his resignation earlier today.

“I can confirm that Mr. Rene Meza resigned as Vodacom Tanzania MD effectively from this morning,” an official close to the mobile phone company confirmed.

“Vodacom executives are currently holding crisis meetings to issue a public statement on Meza’s exit.”

Insiders say Meza has been under fire from the company’s top executives for his role in the scandal where he is known to have received a $5 million bribe from the owner of Shivacom Group, Tanil Somaiya, to keep quiet about the fraud.

It has now been revealed that Meza secretly met at least 10 times with Somaiya and Rostam Aziz, a Vodacom Tanzania shareholder, to negotiate the bribe.

“It is feared that Mr Meza could flee the country after his resignation to avoid criminal prosecution over the matter,” said another insider.

“Rostam and Tanil would also favour Meza’s exit from the country because they can use him as a scapegoat and thwart any criminal investigation against them.”


VODACOM’S COVER-UP ATTEMPT BACK-FIRES

As noted by a section of the Tanzanian media, Vodacom Tanzania issued a carefully-worded statement on 30 April 2015 denying the scandal.

However, the statement signed by Vodacom Tanzania’s chief corporate affairs officer, Georgia Mutagahya, has spectacularly back-fired after the company unsuccessfully tried to play down the massive scandal.

In her statement, Ms. Mutagahya claimed the allegations of fraud and bribery against the company were “grossly inflated.”

She also claimed that there was neither fraud nor a “multi-million dollar loss” suffered as a result of the scandal.

However, a Vodacom Tanzania letter dated 11 July 2012 to Shivacom Group terminating the contract (see below) clearly states that there was massive fraud in the printing, distribution and sale of pirate recharge vouchers by Shivacom.

The letter signed by Vodacom Tanzania’s chief legal officer to Mr Tanil Somaiya, owner of Shivacom Group, also said Vodacom suffered huge financial losses from the fraud.

“It has been established that you have been fraudulently, and in total breach of the contract, producing duplicate pirate electronic recharge vouchers using pin numbers provided by Vodacom,” Vodacom Tanzania’s chief legal officer, Walarick Nittu, said in the letter to Tanil.

He added that Shivacom’s acts of breach have caused “enormous business losses” to Vodacom Tanzania.

Meza and Ms. Mutagahya’s cover-up attempt (pictured together above) has since failed to defuse the situation.

The Parliamentary Finance and Economic Affairs Committee has already ordered the Tanzania Revenue Authority (TRA) to submit a comprehensive report on how much taxes were evaded from the scandal.

There are also reports that the Tanzania Police Force and the Prevention and Combating of Corruption Bureau (PCCB) could soon launch parallel investigations.