A Harare magistrate has canceled an administrative warrant of arrest that was issued against Li Song on August 20, 2024. The warrant had been issued when she was unable to attend court due to illness, and her lawyer had submitted a sick note on the same day, proving her absence was not intentional.
Li Song alleges that documents from the registrar show she had appointed Francesco Marconati as the director of DGL9 on September 18, 2020. She further claims that on February 20, 2023, Marconati forged company documents to appoint his son, Alexandro, as a director of DGL9, and simultaneously removed her from her roles as company director and secretary.
Marconati, on the other hand, accuses Li Song of defrauding the Zimbabwe Revenue Authority (ZIMRA) of USD 40,000 by misrepresenting DGL9 in an application for a duty rebate on chemicals, including cyanide and hydraulic lime, intended for the company’s gold processing plant.
Li Song counters Marconati’s allegations, stating that he blocked the delivery of the chemicals from suppliers and transporters to the mine and fabricated the allegations against her. She also claims that Marconati leveraged his friendship with William Adam, a Bulawayo investigation officer from the Zimbabwe Anti-Corruption Commission (ZACC), to have her arrested after she attended court as a complainant in a separate case against Marconati in May 2024.
Li Song argues that she applied for a duty-free certificate for the chemicals on November 8, 2022, while she was still the company’s director, even according to the allegedly fraudulent CR6 document forged by Marconati and his son. She reported the alleged fraud to the Borrowdale Police Station on February 15, 2024. Ironically, ZACC arrested her in May 2024, three months after her report, despite the investigating officer’s knowledge of the criminal case against Marconati, for which the State had filed evidence provided by the registrar.
Furthermore, Li Song asserts that ZACC officer William Adam has been publicly humiliating and victimizing public prosecutors, magistrates, and Zimbabwe Republic Police (ZRP) investigation officers who have been involved in investigating Marconati’s criminal cases.
