Johannesburg - Limpopo Transport MEC Mapula Mokaba-Phukwana is facing fraud charges for her alleged political interference and personally awarding a tender to a company.
Fraud charges were opened by EFF MPL Jossey Buthane on Wednesday against the MEC and department head Hanli du Plessis.
Polokwane police spokesman Captain Ntobeng Phala confirmed the charges.
The National Treasury has slammed the awarding of the contract as irregular.
Its chief procurement officer, Kenneth Brown, wrote a letter to the head of the provincial Treasury Department, Gavin Pratt, in February, instructing him to immediately end the illegal contract.
The contract, whose value is not known to The Star, was awarded by the MEC to a company identified only as MPA.
Brown, who was part of the national intervention team that President Jacob Zuma sent to rescue Limpopo after it was paralysed by financial mismanagement and maladministration in 2011, was scathing on Wednesday. The Star has seen a letter he wrote to Pratt.
“Interference by the MEC in supply chain management processes is seriously prejudicial to proper financial management and the discharge generally of the statutory objects of the Public Finance Management Act and Treasury regulations,” Brown said.
He instructed Pratt to immediately terminate the “irregular appointment of MPA” and assess the work it had done to determine if the department received value for money.
Sources said MPA was, ironically, appointed to conduct investigations against Bu-thane, who was then manager in the Transport Department.
Brown’s correspondence to Pratt was prompted by Du Plessis’s earlier letter, in which she had asked for his advice.
Du Plessis wrote to Brown to say Mokaba-Phukwana had asked her to draft a service-level agreement between the department and MPA.
Du Plessis said MPA was appointed by the MEC in violation of Treasury regulations that prohibit the MEC, as a political office-bearer, from making such appointments.
Brown copied his letter to Finance Minister Nhlanhla Nene, Premier Stan Mathabatha and former treasury MEC Rudolph Phala. It is unclear if Mathabatha had taken any action against her.
He retained Mokaba-Phukwana as MEC when he reshuffled his cabinet in May.
Mathabatha became premier in 2013, after the previous political leadership paid little attention to the tender rot that festered across government departments.
The premier’s spokesman, Kenny Mathivha, said he would respond on Thursday.
Mokaba-Phukwana could not be reached for comment, while Du Plessis declined to say anything.
Pratt and National Treasury spokeswoman Phumza Macanda could also not be reached for comment at the time of publication.
The Star