JOHANNESBURG - A Pakistani national named Imran Abbas (aka Zaheer Seedat) has pleaded guilty to two counts of fraud for his role in a scam which defrauded the South African Revenue Service of R51m. He has fingered two other Pakistani nationals - the late Abbas Naqvi and his younger brother Aliraza Syed Naqvi - as being the masterminds behind the scheme. Abbas Naqvi was murdered in December 2008. Aliraza Naqvi is currently in jail awaiting trial for his part in the scam.

The syndicate set up two companies on CIPRO with precisely the same names as two legitimate concerns: A fraudulent "SBC International Management Services" was registered with CIPRO in July 2008 and a "Sun Microsystems South Africa Pty Ltd" in November 2008. One "Zaheer Seedat" was listed - along with a number of others - as a director of both companies.

Bank accounts were then opened in the names of the two duplicated companies. Bank details held by the South African Revenue Service were altered and on October 9 2008 R31,6m due to SBC was paid into the fraudulent company's account. On December 23 2008 R19,3m was diverted into the account of the fraudulent Sun Microsystems.

In his guilty plea, submitted on September 2 2010, Imran Abbas says he is a 38 year old Pakistani national. In South Africa he illegally obtained the identity of "Zaheer Seedat." He admits to knowingly registering as a director of the two duplicate companies for the purpose of defrauding SARS.

Imran Abbas states that Abbas Naqvi "was in charge of accounts and asked me to sign cheques which I did." Abbas/Seedat says he was assisted in his actions by several members of a syndicate including Paul Masina, Zia Saddique, Taseer Haider, Nadeem Iqbal and Shazad Nisar Rana.

After Abbas Naqvi's death in early December 2008 "his brother Aliraza Syed Naqvi called at meeting at Midrand and informed us that he knows everything of what his late brother was doing and he was taking over. Aliraza Naqvi demanded that we hand over everything we had and that he is now the ‘boss'. Aliraza Naqvi dumped us as he did not need our services any more. I did not receive much of the money that was taken from SARS as Abbas controlled it and when Aliraza took over he did not involve us any more."

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