Suspected corruption at Ithala
2010-05-27 19:39
Durban - The SACP and Cosatu on Thursday said they suspect a cover-up in the handling of alleged procurement irregularities by Ithala CEO Sipho Shabalala.
The SA Communist Party and the Congress of SA Trade Unions (Cosatu) said in a joint statement: "We were shocked by the announcement by the MEC for economic development and tourism that the CEO of Ithala got away with a written warning for what is seen as very serious misconduct.”
Cosatu provincial secretary Zet Luzipo and SACP provincial secretary Themba Mthembu jointly read the statement during a media briefing in Durban.
Ithala is a state-funded KwaZulu-Natal development bank.
Economic development MEC Mike Mabuyakhulu recently announced that Shabalala had been given a written warning for not following tender procedures on a project worth R169m.
Shabalala awarded a multi-million rand tender to Bomber Chithey Consulting Projects without following proper procedure.
Mthembu and Luzipo said many companies had been ignored when the tender was irregularly awarded.
Mabuyakhulu last month said that no tender had been advertised for the appointment of Bomber-Chithey as it had presented a model of delivery that differed from the others which were available.
Mthembu said Mabuyakhulu had compromised himself by prematurely intervening in the matter and they called on the office of the Auditor General to conduct a forensic investigation.
Dismissed
Mabuyakhulu two weeks ago said the board was "satisfied that there were no personal benefits acquired to the group chief executive" through the awarding of the tender.
Mthembu said they strongly believed that Mabuyakhulu had been misled into believing that the allegations did not warrant stern action be taken against the people involved in the irregularities.
“There is a flood of evidence that show that employees who had committed similar or lesser offences than this one were dismissed, not one, not two, but more than a dozen employees,” Mthembu said.
He did not understand how it was decided not to take action against Shabalala as he had not had a disciplinary hearing.
Mthembu and Luzipo alleged an investigating officer involved in the case had survived an attempt on his life immediately after he had finished an investigation into the matter.
“This shows that this matter is more serious than what the public is made to believe,” they said.
Mthembu said there was no difference between what Shabalala did and what Companies and Intellectual Property Registration Office (Cipro) CEO Keith Sendwe and chief information officer Michael Twum-Darko had been suspended for.
It was recently reported the trade and industry department intended to repudiate a R153m contract with Valor IT to develop a content management system for Cipro.
Cipro's decision to award the contract to Valor IT, a two-man outfit, was being probed by the department and several law enforcement agencies.
Luzipo said they would make sure that Ithala bank was not a cash cow for the elite.
“Ithala is very important for development. It is the downtrodden that is supposed to benefit from the bank and not the elite.”
- SAPA