The City of Joburg Property Company (JPC) has reported that it has discovered several city-owned properties that were fraudulently transferred to other individuals without the city’s knowledge or consent.

The company notes that the case was first identified by the City of Joburg’s (CoJ’s) geographic information system (GIS) department, which tracks and verifies all properties that are transferred so that the city’s billing system can be updated to bill the correct property owners.

The GIS department assisted the JPC by extracting transfers that occurred on the properties that are owned by the city, which were then analysed internally to check the legitimacy of the transfers.

“The preliminary findings by the Property Intelligence and Asset Management Unit indicated that fraudulent documents with forged signatures, purporting to be those of CoJ, JPC and Gauteng Provincial Department of Human Settlements officials were used to fraudulently transfer the properties to other individuals.

“This is not in line with the provisions of Section 14(2) of the Municipal Finance Management Act (MFMA), which governs the disposal of municipal assets,” says the JPC.

Following these findings, the JPC says the Property Intelligence and Asset Management Unit has opened 18 criminal cases with the South African Police Service for further investigation.

The criminal cases were opened between February 17 and March 11, with 13 cases reported in Bramley, two each in Booysens and Honeydew and one in Sandringham.

In addition to the criminal investigations currently under way, the company says JPC Legal Services is currently in the High Court, within Gauteng, to obtain interdicts and court orders to transfer the properties back to the city.

The JPC says it remains committed to safeguarding public assets and ensuring accountability in the management of municipal property.

The entity says it will continue to work closely with law enforcement agencies to ensure that those responsible for these unlawful transactions are held accountable.

The city also reiterates its zero-tolerance stance on fraud, corruption and the unlawful disposal of municipal assets.