R500m in fraud proceeds recovered

Former KZN Premier Senzo Mchunu resigned on May 23. File picture: Sandile Ndlovu

Former KZN Premier Senzo Mchunu resigned on May 23. File picture: Sandile Ndlovu

Published Mar 25, 2015

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Durban - More than R500 million acquired through fraudulent activities by public servants has been forfeited since January last year, as a result of an anti-corruption campaign started by the premier’s office.

The campaign, with the theme “I Do Right - Even When Nobody Is Watching”, was a commitment to doing their best in rooting out fraud and corruption in the province, Premier Senzo Mchunu said.

“We are pleased that the Asset Forfeiture Unit recovered R434.5m between January 2014 and December 2014, and so far in 2015, more than R100m has already been forfeited,” he said.

Although the campaign started in 2011, it was officially launched at the Coastlands on the Ridge Hotel in Durban on Tuesday.

General manager of the Integrity Management Unit, which oversees the campaign, Mandla Msomi, said the main objectives were to instil ethical culture among public servants and service providers, and to get ordinary citizens involved in the fight against corruption.

“We want to restore good and ethical behaviour in public servants and encourage service providers to do business with government without bribing any officials.

“We also want to ensure we have the support of the general public, because when we partner together, we will manage to fight corruption,” he said.

There has been a decline in reported cases of fraud and an increase in convictions.

Between 2010 and 2011, there were 1 024 cases of fraud which dropped to 42 between 2013 and last year.

Convictions increased from 72.66 percent to 88.10 percent between 2010 and last year.

Msomi said these figures were a result of a lot of sources coming forward with information about fraudulent activities, mostly within government.

As to the money forfeited, Msomi said it went into a State account called the Criminal Asset Recovery Account and it was then redistributed to the departments from which it was stolen.

Daily News

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