Elisha Molefe

The Kabasia family in Lehuru- tshe near Zeerust, North West, is spitting fire after their future son-in-law paid a whopping R10000 magadi with counterfeit notes.

Kenneth Mdakana's scheme to dupe his prospective in-laws was exposed by one of his uncles who was part of the magadi negotiating team last Saturday.

The fiancée Keketso's aunt, Suzan Kabasia, said Mdakana's uncle took them by surprise with his announcement that "the R10000 on the table is fake".

"We could not believe his uncle at first, but after inspecting the money we found that many of the bank notes shared the same serial numbers and the quality of the paper was poor," said Kabasia.

"Maybe the boy thought that he would trick the old men who could not differentiate real notes from fake ones."

A case of fraud and possession of counterfeit money has been opened and Mdakana has been arrested. Kabasia said the family spent a lot of money for the wedding preparations.

"People had come from as far as Johannesburg and Botswana for the wedding celebrations. We bought a cow and spent more than R7000 on food and beve- rages for the guests.

"My husband got suspicious when Mdakana bought an expensive bedroom suite and clothes for his bride-to-be because he has never worked in his life."

She said it was not the first time that Mdakana had pulled a fast one on the family.

"He promised to marry our Keketso when she was 16 years old two years ago but failed to show up on the wedding day."

Inspector Wendy Rantshome of Lehurutshe police station said the police recovered counterfeit notes worth R42700 at Mdakana's home.

He will appear in the Zeerust magistrate's court on Monday.