Durban — UThukela District Municipality mayor Inkosi Ntandonyenkosi Shabalala, its speaker and municipal manager face arrest following a forensic report which recommended that they be criminally charged.
The three senior officials are implicated in a report that was handed over to the Co-operative Governance and Traditional Affairs (Cogta) department earlier this month.
In the report, which the Daily News has seen, the trio are implicated in the irregular appointment of the security company that provided security protection to them without any threat assessment report having been produced.
Municipality administrator Nkosinathi Madondo recommended the intervention by Cogta MEC Bongi Sithole-Moloi since the speaker was implicated.
He alleged that it was unlikely for the speaker to act on the report.
The municipality has its head office in Ladysmith, in the north-west of KwaZulu-Natal, and is under IFP control.
The report, compiled by SD Moloi and Associates, found that security company Zenzelewena Protection Services was appointed without following supply chain management policies.
The report revealed that in January, June and July last year, a manager in the mayor’s office issued a memorandum for retrospective approval of the appointment of Zenzelewena Protection Services in terms of the supply chain management regulation 36.
According to the report, the application was approved by the acting municipal manager.
According to the memorandum, the mayor had received life-threatening calls and messages that were reported to police crime intelligence.
It said that while the mayor was waiting for the outcome of the threat analysis, he obtained VIP protection from Zenzelewena Protection Services.
The memo also sought the retrospective approval of the company’s appointment from December when the inaugural meeting was held.
“It is evident from the above that Zenzelewena Protection Services were engaged by the mayor without any involvement by the SCM (supply chain management) unit. It is evident from the table that submissions of the manager in the mayor’s office have been used to justify the payment of protection services for not only the mayor, but also other office-bearers and employees of the municipality.
“The submission only refers to the immediate perceived threat to the mayor at the time of his inauguration in December for the need to appoint Zenzelewena by way of SCM regulation 36. No mention is made in the submission of any threat posed to the other office-bearers or employees. There is no indication on what basis the number of guards allocated to each office-bearer or official was determined,” read the report.
Some of the key findings of the report were that: “These services have been provided on an ongoing basis and hence the renewal of the appointment of the company is neither an emergency nor is it impractical or impossible to apply the SCM policy in appointing a service provider. The SCM unit was not involved in the appointment of Zenzelewena Protection Services.”
The report revealed that the mayor had 12 bodyguards who were paid R705 847 a month. It alleged that one councillor had three guards at R247 583.50 a month, the speaker had four guards costing R311 707.50 a month, while three guards for the deputy mayor and two guards for a municipal manager cost R100 050 a month.
IFP provincial chairperson Thami Ntuli cast doubt on the authenticity of the report and said as the IFP leadership, they were not aware of the report.
Ntuli said they only knew that the municipality had initiated an investigation into alleged corruption by certain employees.
This paper has been reliably informed that more than 12 employees have been placed on suspension in the municipality. However, ANC regional leaders claim the suspensions are a cover-up by the municipal leadership. ANC regional spokesperson Bheki Khanyile called on all officials who benefited from the irregular tender to pay back the money within three months.
Attempts to get comments from the mayor and affected officials were unsuccessful, as they had not responded by the time of publication.
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Daily News