Johannesburg - LTE Consulting chairman Asogan Pillay has resigned because he is uncomfortable with the questionable R200 million contract the company received from the Gauteng Department of Human Settlements without following proper tender procedures.
The Star understands Pillay told board members he feared for his life after an armed robbery at his house last Monday, “and he believed it was linked to the questions he was asking about the project”.
Pillay has been vocal about the dubious circumstances under which the company landed the contract.
Last week, The Star carried a report about LTE asking the department to put the brakes on the multimillion-rand contract for water and sewer reticulation construction in Kanana Park, Sweetwaters, south of Joburg.
Pillay’s house was broken into a few days after The Star made enquiries about the project.
A source said: “One of the robbers put a gun to his head and threatened him. The robbers made off with some cash from the safe and other valuables.
“This was a traumatic experience for his family. He decided to step down to protect his family.”
On Monday, LTE chief executive Thulani Majola confirmed Pillay had resigned, but would not be drawn into the reasons for it.
All he was prepared to say was “I can’t comment. It’s a personal matter.”
However, a source said Pillay had made it clear that “he believed the robbery was meant to scare him as he has been asking too many questions and made it clear that he wanted nothing to do with the project”.
Board members had started questioning how the company had landed the lucrative contract after an engineer wrote an e-mail alerting them to the project and possible legal implications.
Last week, Pillay said the board had enquired about the contract because they did not want to be associated with dodgy deals.
In October, LTE board members wrote to Human Settlements MEC Jacob Mamabolo, asking that the project be put on hold until the issues surrounding it, and how the company landed it, had been sorted out.
In a letter to Mamabolo, LTE legal adviser Gary Vantyi wrote: “Our appointment of an approximately R200 million turnkey appointment, standing alone without any explanatory context, on the face of it appears to be irregular.”
LTE provides consultation for engineering companies. It deals with designs but not construction.
In February, Human Settlements head of department Margaret-Ann Diedericks wrote a letter to LTE, informing the company it had been given the contract to construct water and sewer reticulation for 2 689 stands in Sweetwaters’s Kanana Park project.
The contract was for the installation of sewerage and water pipes for the housing development.
It is not clear how it landed the contract for the construction as it deals only with design and engineering consultation. The company did not have the capacity to complete the job, so Majola appointed Khato Civils to do the construction.
In 2010, President Jacob Zuma visited the Sweetwaters informal settlement and was shocked when he was shown the squalid conditions the community lived in.
The community complained about a lack of basic services, such as water and electricity.
The Star