By ‘Majirata Latela
The Prime Ministers Dr Moeketsi Majoro, has disclosed that the ministry of home affairs has been ordered to complete the building of park homes despite a court case brought by some contractors.
The project to build park homes at ‘Milikane, Sehlabathebe, Ha Sekake and Qacha’s Nek was found to have been riddled with corruption last year when it emerged that the home affairs ministry had paid out M7.8million to a ghost contractor.
The funds were budgeted for the building of park homes in the 2018/2019 financial year, but the ministry later failed to account as it turned out some of the park homes had been ‘built in the air’ although the ministry authorised payment.
After the minister of development planning took a tour to some government projects around the country, the project of building 50 park homes turned out to be a complex money laundering scheme as the payment was authorised even before the project was completed; there was actually no certificate of completion.
Records then showed that the contractor who had been engaged to do the construction was paid, but the money was moved from his account soon after the electronic transfer. It is this contractor who has since instituted legal proceedings against the ministry of home affairs.
This malpractice has since drawn a lot of criticism from several quarters, among development planning minister Selibe Mochoboroane, who last year said: “this is corruption, there is no way one can authorize payment of something that has not been completed. A certificate is given before payment can be made; the person who initiated the payments needs to account why he/she authorised such a payment without making sure that the park homes are there and completed.
“People in this case need to account what happened to government’s money. The project also has an element of fraudulent misrepresentation as the purported contractor denies having received or claimed payment. The contractor has evidence which suggest his signature may have been forged to process the claim.
Economic and public administration experts also pointed out that what happened was corruption which cannot even be window-dressed, and called on the relevant role players in issues of corruption to get to the bottom of the matter.
They emphasised that procurement regulations are very clear on how officers should make sure that elements of corruption or carelessness do not happen and, in this case, officers seem to have played a role in assisting politicians to perpetuate their corrupt own agendas because they are the ones who advise them after doing an evaluation of a project.
The then principal secretary in this regard, they said, definitely has to account for failing to abide by procurement regulations; in this case corruption should be investigated from the awarding of the tenders because that is where maybe the problem started in that the tender was not awarded to a competent contractor.
“Officers who are entrusted with awarding tenders and making sure that projects are completed before payment can be made know very well about due diligence, and if they did not do it then they have failed the nation. In this case, the impact of corruption is going to be felt by the people who the park homes were going to serve, which are the farmers because they were going to be used in the branding and marking of animals and now the project could not be completed. Branding and stock marking is done with the purpose of countering stock theft.
“With farming as one factors that contribute to the economy of the country, branding of animals is vital especially in this time when stock theft cases are reported almost every day. Corruption in this case has affected the rural economy because they are the ones who rely mainly on farming.”
Attempts to get home affairs minister, Motlalentoa Letsosa, to explain the financial implications of the erection of new park homes after the initial botched project were fruitless.
However, he did visit the sites last year and confirmed that the three park homes which were meant to serve as offices for livestock marking were nowhere to be seen despite payment having been made.
“There is something very fishy about the building of those park homes and as the Prime Minister has already called for extensive investigation into the project, I have instructed the principal secretary to also look into it and provide all the needed information to those who will be investigating the matter.
“The Directorate on Corruption and Economics Offences (DCEO) is also conducting its own investigations while the office of the Auditor General is also doing the same. There is so much information that one fails to understand how the payment was authorised while the buildings have not been completed,” Letsosa said at the time.
