Former Land Bank chief executive officer Philemon Mohlahlane appeared briefly in the Commercial Crimes Court in Pretoria on Wednesday with three others accused of embezzling R19 million from the AgriBEE scheme.
Mohlahlane, former Gauteng housing MEC Mpu Daniel Mofokeng, Khutso Mosoma and Matuba Maponya appeared in court on five counts of fraud and five counts of money laundering.
They were released on bail of R40,000 each and the case was postponed until May 3.
The four were arrested by the Hawks on Tuesday.
At the time, Hawks spokesman McIntosh Polela said they allegedly transferred money from the AgriBEE fund to a firm of attorneys.
This money was then allegedly used to buy houses and cars, rather than to fund the struggling small, medium and micro enterprises for which the money was intended.
National Prosecuting Authority spokesman Mthunzi Nhaga said the four allegedly committed the offences between October 2007 and January 2008.
He said it was possible that further charges would be brought.
Limpopo Provincial agriculture spokesman Kenny Mathivha said the department filed numerous charges related to misrepresentation with the Hawks last year.
The Democratic Alliance's Limpopo leader Desiree van der Walt said she approached the Hawks in Limpopo on Wednesday and was told that charges had been laid against Mohlahlane by the Limpopo department of agriculture.
The board of the Limpopo Agricultural Development Corporation appointed Mohlahlane as its CEO last June after he was axed from the Land Bank after about two months in the position
This, after a forensic report by PricewaterhouseCoopers apparently uncovered many irregularities.
The board appointed him over 22 other candidates, apparently without consulting provincial agriculture MEC Dipuo Letsatsi-Duba or Limpopo premier Cassel Mathale.
The Polokwane Observer reported in November that an investigation by an external auditing firm had revealed that Mohlahlane did not pass matric and that his degrees from universities in the United States were bogus.
Mathivha said: “It's a litany of so many things that we are looking at.”
He said he did not know when the matters related to the Limpopo Agricultural Development Corporation would be brought to court.
Van der Walt urged the provincial agricultural department to institute civil proceedings against Mohlahlane to recoup what he was paid of his R1.4 million salary. - Sapa