Naz Malik, the former chief executive of the now-defunct Welsh race equality charity Awema, will be charged with theft and fraud.
It is the latest development in a long-running saga for Awema, which has been mired in controversy since 2011 after allegations of financial irregularity were made against its chief executive Malik.
As a result, six trustees including the vice-chair resigned in protest; the Welsh government and Big Lottery Fund froze funding to the charity; and the Charity Commission opened a statutory inquiry. The charity closed last year.
This week, the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) has said that there is sufficient evidence to bring charges against Awema’s former chief executive Naz Malik.
The police will issue a summons for Malik and he will be charged when he attends court.
Catrin Attwell, senior crown prosecutor for CPS Wales' complex casework unit, said: "My conclusion is that there is sufficient evidence and it is in the public interest to charge Naz Malik with offences of theft and fraud by false representation."
Awema received around £8m in public funding a year. The Public Accounts Committee, which reviewed the Welsh government’s grant system following the Awema scandal, has said there needs to be more stringent conditions for recipients of public funding.
The latest development on Awema has generated much interest among Welsh Assembly Members with a number tweeting the news today –
WCVA warns of dramatic drop in public funding
Elsewhere, the Wales Council for Voluntary Action (WCVA) has today warned that Welsh charities funded by the Welsh government have seen “a dramatic fall in the amount of money they receive”.
The Welsh government's reported spend on services provided by charities in 2012/13 was £307m, compared with £334.8m the previous year - a fall of 11 per cent in real terms (8.6 per cent in cash terms).
WCVA chief executive, Graham Benfield, said the sector was faring worse than other areas of the Welsh government's expenditure. "In addition to this, WCVA statistics estimated the income of the sector in 2012 was £1.63bn, compared with an estimate of £1.61bn in 2009.”
He added. “So income has fallen in real terms by 8.6 per cent since 2009, despite the inclusion of new housing associations due to stock transfer whose rental income has added a significant amount to the sector.
“If housing association rent was excluded, income had fallen from £1.35bn to £1.19bn, a fall of £160m, or a real-value fall of 21.6 per cent.
"Putting together the data from the recent Sustainable Funding Cymru survey with an analysis of the Welsh government's published expenditure over £25,000, we have a bleak picture," said Benfield.
