Featured image: Wicknell Chivayo tours at ZiTF with President Mnangagwa
We too were taken aback by the prices on the invoice for technology equipment supposedly issued to Zimbabwe Electoral Commission by a South African company Renform.
The allegations are that an SA company, Renform, was used by controversial local businessman, Wicknell Chivayo and his colleagues to sell technology equipment to ZEC at inflated prices, in exchange for a commission. Apparently, commissions to the tune of $1m.
This invoice was topical on Zim social media this past week. Topical because an apparent leaked audio (whose authenticity is still not clear) discusses payments around this invoice.
It’s clear that the prices are inflated. But we thought it’d make better sense to get actualy prices of the equipment invoiced from an actual retailer of technology equipment in Zimbabwe.
Whether these allegations are true or not is still not clear, and the article is not meant to answer that. We were more interested in the general value of the items. So we asked one local retailer who supplies this equipment to quote us the same. Below are the unit prices they gave us. They only provided price for what they have in stock. They obviously don’t stock BVR kits and did not give prices for those.
The prices include VAT. This is important because the Renform prices do not.
| Item | Alleged Price Invoiced to ZEC | Local Retailer Price (inc VAT) | |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Server (HP Proliant dl380 gen10) | $1 264 865 | $4 140 |
| 2 | Server Software | $126 030 | $1 550 |
| 3 | Servicing Contract (SLA Hardware & Software) | $1 505 440 | 30% of contract |
| 4 | BVR Kits | $15 759 | n/a |
| 5 | IWB Software | $14 716 | n/a |
| 6 | LICENSES | $2 080 355 | n/a |
| 7 | DELL XPS Laptop – 15.6 inch, FHD+ Laptop – Intel Core i7- 12700H 1TB SSD 32GB RAM Win 11 Pro | $4 146 | $2 200 |
| 8 | COLOUR PRINTER HP M455 | $1 133 | $450 |
| 9 | Printer Cartridges (Set of CMYK 6000+ Pages) | $1 455 | $400 |
| 10 | USB Flash Drive 16GB | $7.5 | $5 |
| 11 | Samsung Galaxy Tab – A7 32GB | $422 | $220 |
| 12 | USB Cable for Printer | $9.30 | $5 |
Totals compared
We wanted to get the full picture of the totals so here’s a table of that below:
| Item | Qty | Alleged Price Invoiced to ZEC | Local Retailer Price (inc VAT) | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Server (HP Proliant dl380 gen10) | 1 | $1 264 865 | $4 140 |
| 2 | Server Software | 1 | $126 030 | $1 550 |
| 7 | DELL XPS Laptop – 15.6 inch, FHD+ Laptop – Intel Core i7- 12700H 1TB SSD 32GB RAM Win 11 Pro | 6 | $24 876 | $13 200 |
| 8 | COLOUR PRINTER HP M455 | 1 | $1 133 | $450 |
| 9 | Printer Cartridges (Set of CMYK 6000+ Pages) | 2 | $2 910 | $800 |
| 10 | USB Flash Drive 16GB | 250 | $1 875 | $1 250 |
| 11 | Samsung Galaxy Tab – A7 32GB | 6 | $2 532 | $1 320 |
| 12 | USB Cable for Printer | 1 | $9.30 | $5 |
| Totals | $1,424,230 | $22,715 |
Based on the above, if it is indeed true that ZEC was invoiced and paid the invoice, it paid about $1.5m for equipment worth just $23k.
This is excluding the prices of BVR kits, which the local technology retailer does not stock. It also excludes the Servicing Contract which we have no way of determining locally beyond the indication that it would be 30% of the value.
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