A woman who was convicted by the Waigani National Court for stealing over K66,000 is honouring her commitment to repaying the monies.
Margaret Ani of Pari village, Port Moresby, appeared in court before Deputy Chief Justice Sir Gibbs Salika today and gave an update of her repayment progress.
Her lawyer told the court she has repaid K5,000 so far and is expecting her Nasfund savings to be released by the end of the month.
She has an outstanding K61,000 to repay within the next five months.
“You continue to make your repayment. You honour what you told the court at the time. You still have five months to go and I urge you to make those payments,” Sir Gibbs told Ani and her lawyer.
She is expected back in court on Dec 5 to give her next update on her repayment.
Ani was sentenced to three years with hard labour on Feb 29 this year after the court found her guilty of forging 24 pay cheques, totalling K66,164.64 belonging to the Port Moresby Cancer Relief Society.
She was a volunteer with the society as the treasurer in 2012 when she forged the signatures of Dadi Toka Jnr 24 times.
The sentence period was suspended and she was given 12 months from Feb 29 to repay all the monies, failure to do so will see her serve an outstanding period of the sentence.
During the trial hearing of Ani’s case, the court was also told she stole the cancer funds as she was under pressure from her partner to give him money to repay his debts.