Video by Sihle Mavuso
Jozini - The troubled Mhlathuze water board in Richards Bay in northern KwaZulu-Natal, says it has halted all tenders flagged as being corruptly issued during an internal forensic investigation.
The water board said when the report which unearthed the corruption amounting to millions came to the fore, it resolved to address the issue in a three-pronged manner.
The first act was to discipline the staff involved, then share the report with the Hawks and set aside all the tenders that were found to be tainted.
The water entity’s interim chief executive officer, Dr Simo Lushaba said this when he faced the media for the first time on Thursday since taking over the hot seat.
Lushaba was appointed to the position a few weeks ago to hold the fort following the suspension and arrest of the entity’s CEO, Mthokozisi Duze for alleged corruption.
Duze was arrested with suspended CEO, Babongile Mnyandu and they are currently out on bail.
It has been alleged that in one instance, they approved inflated payment to Mhlanga Inc, a law firm based in Durban.
In return, the director of the law firm, Sithembelo Ralpha Mhlanga, paid them handsome kickbacks for the inflated invoices for legal work which was also questionable.
Mhlanga and two others are also out on bail for the same case after the Hawks swooped on them towards the end of August this year.
Lushaba outlined the actions taken by the board to address the matter: “The board then took a decision that these reports, we are going to approach them in a three-pronged fashion.
“First of all we are going to have our own disciplinary processes, but at the same time, we are going to take these reports to the Hawks.
“But we are also going to initiate criminal and civil proceedings against all those that were involved internally and externally.
“So, where we found service providers or people that had entered into contract with us who had been found through those reports to have been involved in any malfeasance we have stopped that work, we did not continue with that work.
“And in addition to that, we are taking all of that through the criminal justice system in as far as they are concerned,” said Lushaba.
Meanwhile, Lushaba said, the pending merger with Umgeni water in line with the government’s resolution that in every province there should be one water board, had still has not been finalised.
This was in response to a question from IOL regarding what would happen to the large scale industries in Richards Bay which are directly supplied by Mhlathuze water at a lower rate than Umgeni water which is charging almost double the amount.
Lushaba tried to reassure existing clients that even if Mhlathuze water was absorbed by Umgeni water, the tariffs would not be arbitrarily changed.
“Secondly, all these tariffs you are referring to, particularly with industry, but all our tariffs, we negotiated them with our clients, there are contractual arrangements.
“So, we can't just come in and say my tariffs are higher therefore… we sit around, we look at every aspect that affects tariffs,” Lushaba said.
Other than supplying bulk water to the City of Mhlathuze (Richards Bay-Mpangeni) Mhlathuze water also directly supplies to large private clients like Richards Bay Minerals (RBM), Fostoria and Tronox, amongst others.
Umgeni Water, on the other hand, supplies bulk water to municipalities like eThekwini which then supply water to local industries.
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