Not only are KwaZulu-Natal principals helping themselves to food intended for impoverished pupils, but education officials are also, via the R1.1 billion National School Nutrition Programme (NSNP), doing business with the department that employs them.
“The NSNP is corrupt,” MEC Senzo Mchunu told members of the provincial legislature’s portfolio committee on education in Pietermaritzburg.
Mchunu’s remark was prompted by the presentation of a report on the feeding scheme by his department to MPLs.
According to the report, corruption is “prevalent”, as department officials and teaching staff are doubling as suppliers, and contracts to supply meals are being awarded through the “flouting” of supply-chain management rules.
Suppliers are also said to be creating monopolies by bribing schools to win tenders.
During Friday’s meeting, Mchunu said that the “main” perpetrators of the corruption were principals, followed by department officials.
He said that only a week ago a principal had been caught en route home with a “large portion” of the uncooked food.
“He said he’s short of groceries at home… He won’t have been the only (principal to do so).”
But the sort of corruption which was “most rife” among principals Mchunu said, was where they colluded to, in effect, do business with the department.
So prevalent was the abuse of the nutrition programme, Mchunu said, that when he and his fellow cabinet members compared figures on corruption involving officials across their departments, his had the dubious honour of coming out tops.
Although Mchunu said there was a “long list” of individuals found guilty subsequent to disciplinary hearings, the department's report on the matter had not yet been finalised. - The Mercury