Pretoria - Charges of corruption have been lodged against former North West University (NWU) vice-chancellor, Dr Theuns Eloff, for allegedly donating R10 million to a trust without permission from the institution’s council.
On Tuesday, the Higher Education Transformation Network (HETN) opened a corruption case against Eloff, former NWU chief financial officer Professor Johan Rost and Bartholomeus Jooste at the Pretoria Central police station. The case has since been transferred to the Potchefstroom police station.
NWU vice-chancellor Professor Dan Kgwadi instituted a forensic investigation into the R10m last year and a report is expected soon.
Eloff told Pretoria News he found out that HETN had opened a case against him through the media.
“I choose not to comment at this time because there is a forensic investigation going on, and I choose to wait for that before I make any statements. I have given my full co-operation to the auditors and I have done nothing wrong,” Eloff said.
It is alleged that in 2013, Rost, on the instruction of Eloff, donated R10m to the North West Higher Education Trust run by Dibako Consulting. Jooste is the managing director of the trust.
HETN executive chairman Lucky Thekisho said it wanted the Department of Higher Education and Training to institute a forensic investigation into all the financial affairs of the university.
“Eloff’s corrupt activities need to be exposed. They wanted to use the R10m to build a business school and then rent it to the university,” Thekisho alleges.
Chairman of the NWU council, Johan Kruger, said the institution would not comment as the matter was part of an ongoing forensic investigation, but said HETN was making unfounded allegations against council members. “There are simply no grounds for HETN to make allegations such as that ‘fraud had been committed’ and that an ‘unauthorised transfer’ of ‘state funds’ had occurred. These and other allegations made by HETN are not only irresponsible and audacious but are all the more surprising in view of the latter’s own admission that the forensic process has still to be completed,” Kruger said.
He said HETN made statements based on misinformation and disrespect for the probe.
Thekisho claimed council members wanted to quash the investigation and tried to protect Eloff. But Kruger rubbished the claims. “It is simply a lie that council at any stage attempted to end the forensic audit. To present this as if it constitutes a fact is beyond reasonable comprehension and not supported by the facts,” Kruger said.
Pretoria News