The long-awaited 700-page, full Manase and Associates report, promises to be more explosive say sources.
|||The long-awaited 700-page, full Manase & Associates report is expected to be finally tabled at Wednesday’s full council meeting.
Several executive committee members said on Monday, that according to a resolution taken by the committee during an in-committee meeting on Thursday last week, the report would be tabled for the first time on Wednesday.
The forensic report, said the councillors, who spoke on condition of anonymity, was more explosive than the 18-page summarised version given to the media earlier this month by Co-operative Governance MEC Nomusa Dube. “It gives a breakdown of how much in irregular expenditure each of the implicated officials spent,” said one councillor.
The councillors said that during the in-committee meeting, which was held at the Moses Mabhida Stadium, each committee member was given a copy of the full report before it was discussed.
“Committee members will first have an in-committee meeting on Wednesday morning to finish deliberation before the report is tabled at full council,” said another councillor, adding that members were not allowed to take the report home with them.
Another councillor said that while some councillors were against the tabling of the report, the committee had “no choice but to” because Dube had given the committee a time-frame to report back to council and decide on what action should be taken.
“Some councillors were worried that there might be some legal implication for the city if the report was made public, because it was highly likely that the implicated officials would take action against the city if that damning report was revealed,” said the councillor. “But people, including all the political parties and Durban citizens, want to know what is contained in that report.”
Two weeks ago, committee members were left bitterly disappointed after they failed to receive the full report.
Too costly
According to the members, city manager S’bu Sithole had told them that it was too costly to print 700 pages for each exco member.
The forensic investigation into allegations of maladministration, fraud and corruption into the eThekwini municipality, which was commissioned by Dube almost a year ago, has already revealed that 10 councillors and 123 municipal officials had been doing business with the city.
Briefing the media earlier this month, Dube said that appropriate action should be instituted by the metro council against those implicated.
Several high-ranking municipal officials, including former municipal manager Michael Sutcliffe and former mayor Obed Mlaba, were fingered in the investigation.
Other top officials identified in the report include Treasurer Krish Kumar, city manager for infrastructure Derek Naidoo, and head of housing Cogi Pather. These officials could face disciplinary action, with the auditors in some cases recommending that funds be recovered.
Some of the implicated officials have fired back at Dube and the report, questioning why only certain individuals were singled out.
Sutcliffe has questioned why Dube failed to act against her own sister, who was doing business with the metro where she was an employee, before pointing fingers at others.
Dube’s spokesman, Lennox Mabaso, however, said that the MEC’s sister had been among 38 municipal employees who were found by the auditor-general to have been doing business with the municipality.
Sutcliffe has also accused Dube of acting in a racist way in her handling of the report.
He has further asked the municipality to bear the costs of any legal action he intends pursuing over the report.
Mayor James Nxumalo, who said the finding did not come as a surprise, said the report should be seen as a wake-up call for the city to “arrest toxic practices” that characterised the behaviour of officials and councillors disregarding applicable procedures.
“There was already a report from Ngubane and Co, so we were not at all surprised by the Manase findings,” he said.
The report by the forensic investigations firm had also called for disciplinary action and investigation into the city’s financial affairs. - Daily News
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