The Department of Home Affairs is finally acting against one of its employees from the Durban office who allegedly issued a fraudulent death certificate that was used by a fraudster to claim a funeral policy from Capitec Bank.
The department has since hauled the unnamed employee before a disciplinary hearing. And the victim, a 27-year-old student of the University of KwaZulu-Natal (UKZN), Thandeka Majola, is expected to testify about how she found that she had been fraudulently declared dead.
Victim to testify
The disciplinary hearing will take place in Durban on Thursday. And Majola confirmed to Sunday World that she has been summoned to come and testify.
Majola only discovered that she was a walking dead woman on December 27, 2023, when she tried to transfer money to her Capitec account.
When the transaction bounced, she went to her branch at Pinecrest in Pinetown to enquire about the matter.
When she got there, the bank told her that the account was closed because she had been declared dead. She was told the person claimed a funeral policy, which had been taken in her name.
Majola claims that Home Affairs in Chatsworth in Durban confirmed that she was declared dead. This was done by someone called Jabulani Eric Mkhize. They gave her all the documents that were used.
She said what was strange was that Mkhize used a police affidavit and death certificate. This was signed off by a doctor based in Isipingo in the south of Durban. Mkhize allegedly claimed that Majola did not have an ID, so he produced a birth certificate.
Home Affairs flouted procedures
The department allegedly failed to check Mkhize’s claims regarding the ID and processed the death certificate.
Capitec Bank has previously confirmed that Majola was declared dead. As a result, her bank account was closed. The bank said it could not do anything until the department of changes her status to alive – and that has since been done.
Meanwhile, Mkhize is yet to be arrested and prosecuted for the crime after the SAPS docket was closed. This was based on an instruction from the National Prosecuting Authority (NPA) in KwaZulu-Natal. When it was asked why the case was closed, the NPA asked to be given time to investigate the decision. However, it never came back with answers.
