A small Bryanston-based firm is determined to proceed with legal action against JSE-listed ICT company Gijima.
Corporate Constellations wants to see Gijima face criminal charges in court after allegedly not completing a R1 million online portal project, and billing for items that were allegedly never delivered.
Operations director Anne Ekstein says the company and its advocate are in the process of preparing documentation for presentation to the state prosecutor, in a bid to overturn a previous decision by the prosecuting authorities to dismiss a criminal charge against Gijima.
However, no date has yet been set for a meeting between the company, its legal representatives, and the state prosecutor, she says.
Gijima previously rubbished Corporate Constellations' claims, blaming a former staff member for improperly entering into the deal with Corporate Constellations. Gijima has said it had no choice but to walk away from the project.
Loss of revenue
Corporate Constellations' legal claims are based on a contract that Ekstein says Gijima never completed. She says the company is also moving ahead with a civil suit, to claim R15 million in damages for loss of revenue after contracts with it were cancelled because Gijima did not deliver a portal that was integral to its operations.
Ekstein says GijimaAst was contracted to develop a portal around which Constellations' business hinged and which was set to be ready before the company launched in February. However, this never happened, and Gijima also charged it for items that were never supplied, she alleges.
Gijima previously stated it walked away from the contract because one of its staff members entered into the deal fraudulently.
Thoko Mnyango, Gijima's managing executive of marketing, communication and transformation, said the contract was not a “bona fide business arrangement” because the staff member had an undisclosed interest in Corporate Constellations and did not stick to internal processes.
As a result, she says, the company walked away from the deal, held a disciplinary procedure and dismissed the staff member. Mnyango has also referred to the criminal charges as an attempt to publicly embarrass the listed company.
Gijima did not respond to a request for comment this morning.
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