At least 22 suspects have been arrested so far for TERS related fraud and the department has warned that more arrests are imminent.
In April, two directors of an engineering company were arrested in Gauteng after allegedly defrauding the Unemployment Insurance Fund (UIF) out of more than R648 000 in TERS relief funds.
Between August 2020 and March 2021, the two suspects allegedly applied for Covid-19 TERS for 95 people who were not their employees without their knowledge and consent. The company directors subsequently received R648 915.
This became apparent when employees applied for normal unemployment benefits from the UIF but their ID numbers indicated they were benefiting from the TERS scheme. Their ID numbers were included in the TERS applications by the two directors.
UIF Commissioner, Teboho Maruping has praised the collaborative effort between police and the Department of Employment and Labour’s risk management team.
The Risk Management officials, together with the police, opened a case of fraud against the two directors which led to their arrest on Monday 11 April 2022. The pair were granted bail with the matter being postponed to 3 June 2022.
Maruping hopes that the arrest would send a strong message against would-be-fraudsters.
He said, “I am truly grateful to our Risk Management officials and law enforcement agencies for their great work in bringing these and other suspects to justice”.
