Johannesburg - The suspended managing director of Pikitup, Amanda Nair, is still getting her full salary of R69 000 a month, seven months after being suspended.
The DA asked the question at the City of Joburg’s monthly meeting. Mayor Parks Tau said the disciplinary hearing had not taken place even though Nair had been placed only on a two-month suspension.
Tau said consultation would be taking place this week, but the hearing would probably not be held before January or February.
DA councillor Anthony Still, who asked the question in the council meeting, said it was unacceptable that it took so long to hold a disciplinary hearing.
“There seems to be no concern about time – this is ratepayers’ money we are spending on having her sitting at home on full pay. There has to be urgency around this,” Still said.
Nair was suspended over irregularities in the advertising of a R263 million tender.
She has been embroiled in a scandal surrounding the awarding of a tender last year to Aqua Transport Plant Hire, a firm that was implicated in wrongdoing despite the bid adjudication committee questioning her decision. Pikitup then appointed Ernst & Young to conduct an investigation into several companies providing services to it.
The probe recommended that Aqua should be charged criminally with fraud because of alleged irregular activities, including suspected tender collusion.The inquiry also recommended that Aqua be made to pay back money it had allegedly overcharged the utility.
Nair was charged, among other things, with:
* Unexplained advertising of the tender with a scope exceeding the available budget.
* Alleged irregularities surrounding the advertising of the R263m tender.
* Unexplained escalation of the costs regarding the tender, from R42m in July 2012 to the current R399m.
The Star was shown a copy of the report, and when Nair found out, she sent police to the newspaper’s offices to conduct a preliminary investigation following charges laid by Nair against the newspaper for being in illegal possession of private and confidential documents. There has been no follow-up by police on the matter.
The Star