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The Congress of South African Trade Unions welcomes the report by Public Protector, Thuli Madonsela, that finds the Commissioner of the SAPS, Bheki Cele, guilty of ‘maladministration’ in a lease deal which would cost the taxpayers three times the market rate for a new police headquarters in Durban.

The SAPS offered to pay businessman Roux Shabangu R1.16 billion rand for a 10-year lease that the Public protector found to be worth less than one-third of that amount.

This follows a report by Thuli Madonsela of a similar deal that also concluded that Cele was guilty of misconduct for trying to lease a national police headquarters from Shabangu in Pretoria, also at an inflated price.

It is particularly disturbing that during her investigation into these cases, in March 2011, the Public Protector received a ‘visit’ from SAPS officers, and has reportedly threatened by rogue elements within the police with being charged with ‘corruption’ over a matter which has long ago been resolved.

It follows a pattern of whistle-blowers being threatened and even murdered to stop them exposing evidence of corruption.

The Public Protector urged Police Minister Nathi Mthethwa to discipline Cele, and she suggested that President Jacob Zuma should review the position of Public Works Minister Gwen Mahlangu-Nkabinde, who approved these two deals and failed to cooperate with the investigation. COSATU agrees with her advice to the President - “to do the right thing”.

These two cases follow a pattern revealed in a report by the Special Investigating Unit that it has been probing allegations that suppliers to the ministry of public works have been colluding with officials to charge wildly inflated prices of up to four times the real costs.

The Public Protector argues that in the two cases under investigation there is insufficient evidence to establish criminality. But surely this is a form of corruption, just like price-fixing, which is illegal and amounts to theft from the public.

Millions of rands of public money is being squandered to line the pockets of corrupt businesspeople and public servants. A culture of abuse has mushroomed and is spreading.

Allegations of corruption and the misuse of public funds are piling up and, while we welcome the probes being made by ministers like Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan and Human Settlements Minister Tokyo Sexwale, the president needs to allay fears that the perception that we are sinking into a corruption-ridden banana republic.

The federation wants to demand to know why ministers accused of serious offences do not follow their conscience, and the example of those in many other countries, and resign while the charges are investigated, rather than sit and wait until they are dismissed.

COSATU has called for President Zuma to either assure the country that reports of gross misuse of public by Co-operative Governance Minister Sicelo Shiceka are untrue, or to dismiss him. We are still awaiting a response.

We have called for a statement from the President on how the State Security Minister Siyabonga Cwele could have been ‘sleeping on duty’ and failed to be aware that his wife was involved in drug smuggling. We are still awaiting a response.

We hope that he will now swiftly respond to these questions and to the Public protector’s reports on the SAPS deals.