Zuma knew about Nkandla costs - report

2012-11-23 08:46

A photo of President Jacob Zuma's Nkandla compound. (Cornél van Heerden, Beeld

Johannesburg - President Jacob Zuma knew exactly how much of taxpayers’ money was being spent on the upgrade to his Nkandla residence, a report on Friday stated.

The Mail&Guardian revealed that Zuma was given “exhaustive details” about the progress at the Nkandla complex as early as November 2010.

This brought into question his vehement denial in Parliament last week that he was unaware of the scale of the project.

Last week, Zuma said in response to a question in the National Assembly: "All the buildings and every room we use in that residence was built by ourselves as family, and not by government.

Zuma said he was "aggrieved" by media reports that government had paid more than R200m for his home.

"On TV, they showed the house that I paid for. And they lie that it has been built by government. It has not been built by government.

In the documents, the Nkandla project was referred to as “prestige project A” and showed how Zuma’s private contribution fell by half from R20m to just over R10m, while total costs more than doubled.

The documents also showed that taxpayers paid for buildings for personal use by the Zuma family and not for security, as was also claimed by the department of public works.

Some of the documents were marked “top secret”.

The total cost of construction escalated from R111.3m in 2010 to R248m in 2012, the documents in the M&G’s possession show.

 

- News24