Gauteng Premier, David Makhura has repeatedly missed his own deadlines to release all the corruption reports on his provincial government that have been handed over to the Special Investigating Unit (SIU), but has finally committed to releasing a consolidated report by the end of next week.

This was disclosed by Infrastructure Development MEC Jacob Mamabolo on behalf of the Premier in an oral reply to my questions in the Gauteng Legislature earlier this week.

Initially Makhura said in a written reply that he would release a consolidated report in June last year, and later in a committee meeting said by the end of 2021.

According to Mamabolo, the delay was due to the need to verify information with all departments and other agencies.

I pressed him as to why the individual reports would not be made available, but he refused to comment on this.

The individual reports cover all investigations since March 2014 and probably contain dynamite information on corruption involving billions of rands.

It appears that many investigation reports were simply filed away years ago and not acted on.

I hope that the consolidated report will not hide key details in the individual reports that may implicate MECs or other senior ANC officials.

There should be no cover-up or fudging of accountability for corrupt or negligent acts that have wasted huge amounts of money that should have benefited people in this province.

Stealing government money hurts the poor the most as they suffer when clinics and schools are not built in time, or welfare benefits don’t reach them.

The DA will push for full disclosure of all the reports and the full implementation of corrective actions to stop the stealing.

 

Issued by DA Member of the Oversight Committee on the Premier’s Office (OCPOL), Jack Bloom MPL