Parliament's standing committee on finance's wants answers from the National Treasury about the implementation of the Mpati Commission's report at the Public Investment Corporation, demanding that Minister Tito Mboweni set the political tone about the direction government intends to take in dealing with transgressors.
Mboweni and his deputy David Masondo attracted the ire of MPs on Wednesday when they did not show up to brief the Committee about the Mpati Commission of Inquiry Report and progress towards implementation of its recommendations.
Last week, the new PIC CEO, Abel Sithole told journalist that the state-owned asset manager had made significant progress in implementing two thirds of the Commission's recommendations but it had not started on matters involving former or its current staff members, including investigating Dan Matjila.
The Committee said as the department to which the President delegated the issue of this report to, Mboweni was the one who was supposed to be overseeing its implementation and making sure that all recommendations are being executed.
But instead, he has postponed briefing the Committee about progress a couple of times. Committee Chairperson, Joseph Maswanganyi said after postponing his appearance to the Committee in June, Mboweni had committed that he'd make sure he makes a presentation about how he would want to implement the report's recommendations.
He said for Treasury to send officials to deal with this "...very serious" report after all the postponements showed that Parliament didn't enjoy the same respect that the executive and the judiciary do.
While some suggested that maybe it was time to go ahead without the Minister's presence, most MPs said this was too big an issue to have "piecemeal" briefings here and there because the report has far reaching implications relating to legislation as well.
"This is a very serious report. The public is waiting for this report with anticipation. There's a lot of discussion in the public domain about this report and the political tone is very important to show how government is dealing with this report," said Maswanganyi.
He said the Minister, or his deputy need to make time either tomorrow or on Friday for the Committee.
He said there were lot of political issues that need to be responded to by a political head which the PIC or its board cannot answer.
