Zahui, 59, of Fairfax, Virginia, is accused of abusing his senior position by directing USADF funds to a contractor for little or no work performed, while personally receiving cash payments in return.
The Director of Financial Management of the United States African Development Foundation (USADF), Mathieu Zahui, has been charged by criminal information and has agreed to plead guilty to accepting illegal gratuities from a government contractor and lying to federal law enforcement officers.
The US Department of Justice announced this on Friday.
Zahui, 59, of Fairfax, Virginia, is accused of abusing his senior position by directing USADF funds to a contractor for little or no work performed, while personally receiving cash payments in return.
“Mathieu Zahui is charged with accepting payments from a government contractor and then abusing his position by directing USADF funds to that contractor for little-to-no work,” said Assistant Attorney General A. Tysen Duva of the Justice Department’s Criminal Division.
Duva added that corruption by senior officials “cheats American taxpayers and rigs the system against honest work.”
Court documents reportedly show that Zahui, who referred to himself as the “Chief Financial Officer” of USADF, arranged for the agency to pay vendors and contractors through a Kenya-based company identified as Company-1, instead of making direct payments.
Company-1 was owned by a government contractor, identified as Contractor-1 (CC-1), whom Zahui had known for more than 20 years.
Between June 2020 and December 2023, Zahui allegedly caused Company-1 to act as a pass-through for USADF payments to vendors. In several cases, vendors were instructed to invoice Company-1 rather than USADF.
Company-1 would then bill USADF, adding significant mark-ups despite providing no services related to the work.
In one instance, when USADF needed to settle a past-due debt to a staffing vendor, Company-1 invoiced USADF with a mark-up of more than $20,000.
Zahui approved the invoice despite knowing the company had done no work to justify the additional charge.
Investigators said Zahui approved more than 20 such pass-through invoices, with mark-ups ranging from 17 percent to 66 percent.
As a result, USADF paid at least $617,625.49 to Company-1, which retained $134,886.34 as profit.
In connection with these transactions and other official acts benefiting Company-1, Zahui accepted $12,000 in cash from CC-1.
The scheme was not disclosed to the Bureau of the Fiscal Service, which oversees and authorizes USADF’s external payments.
Prosecutors said Company-1 falsely claimed on invoices that it had provided “logistical support” to USADF.
One example cited involved a $50,000 membership fee owed by USADF to a professional networking organization serving the African diaspora.
Instead of paying the fee directly, Zahui allegedly directed Company-1 to submit an invoice claiming it provided “logistical assistance support for ADF,” adding a mark-up of $9,900.08.
When questioned by federal law enforcement officers in 2024, Zahui denied receiving any benefits from CC-1.
Authorities say this statement was false, as he had received $12,000 in cash payments.
“The USADF Director of Financial Management’s fraudulent acts betrayed the trust of the American people,” said Sean M. Bottary, Acting Assistant Inspector General for Investigations at the U.S. Agency for International Development’s Office of Inspector General (USAID-OIG), noting that the agency would continue to aggressively pursue fraud involving U.S. foreign assistance funds.
Zahui has agreed to plead guilty to one count of accepting illegal gratuities and one count of making a false statement to federal law enforcement.
He faces a maximum penalty of two years in prison on the gratuities charge and up to five years on the false statement charge.
A federal district court judge will schedule his plea hearing and determine his sentence after considering the U.S. Sentencing Guidelines and other statutory factors.
USAID-OIG is investigating the case, while prosecutors include Assistant Chief Kyle Hankey of the Justice Department’s Criminal Division Fraud Section and Assistant U.S. Attorney Sungtae Kang for the District of Columbia.