Pietermaritzburg – Pietermaritzburg’s award-winning municipal manager, Mxolisi Nkosi, who was suspended last month, has been replaced by a woman he allegedly wanted investigated for her role in processes leading to a local security company being overpaid by R8.5 million.
The astonishing claim was made on Tuesday by the Democratic Alliance’s mayoral candidate Mergan Chetty.
Chetty claimed that Msunduzi’s acting municipal manager, Boniwe Zulu, and the municipality’s process manager for risk management, Kwenza Khumalo, had been implicated by an internal report into the anomaly.
“Additionally, the internal report had also recommended that the matter should be reported to the police and the special investigating unit (SIU). To date, this has not come to fruition,” said Chetty.
He said that the report indicated that Khulesani Security Risk Management (KSA) had been overpaid by R8 489 041.21.
Nkosi had informed KSA that that it had been overpaid and that once the internal audit unit had determined by how much, this amount would be deducted from future payments.
However, Nkosi was then suspended and Zulu was appointed acting municipal manager.
“Despite the fact that an internal audit report revealed that Zulu had signed off on payment documentation, which authorised the over-payment to KSA, she was appointed as acting municipal manger a month ago,” said Chetty.
Msunduzi spokeswoman, Nqobile Madondo, said: “Following the recent media reports regarding the Khuselani Security Risk Management and the internal audit report, the media is hereby advised that the ‘report’ being referred to here has not been dealt with by Council as it has not been to the Executive Committee or Full Council”.
Madondo added: “It would thus be improper to comment on a matter that Council has not had deliberations on.
“It is very worrisome that a matter that has not been brought before Council already attracts so much media coverage and has names of senior managers mentioned in it, without the proper channels or investigations having been concluded.”
African News Agency
* Use IOL’s Facebook and Twitter pages to comment on our stories. See links below.