Sports Minister Fikile Mbalula and his deputy Gert Oosthuizen have taken scores more flights than their international relations counterparts, racking up a R2.6 million bill on 345 domestic and international flights since 2010.
That’s 186 more flights than Minister of International Relations and Co-operation Maite Nkoana-Mashabane, for whom travel is an essential part of her responsibilities, and her two deputies.
Nkoana-Mashabane and her deputies, Marius Fransman and Ebrahim Ebrahim, took a combined 159 domestic and international flights in the same period, said DA MP Winston Rabotapi.
In a parliamentary reply to questions by Rabotapi, Mbalula disclosed that since April 1, 2010, his deputy, Oosthuizen, had spent R1.1m on 105 flights, 29 of them international flights.
Oosthuizen spent more time travelling overseas than the minister, who spent R747 410 on 16 international flights.
“It is hard to imagine on what grounds the deputy minister of sport and recreation could possibly justify spending more than R1m on flights in just under two years and taking almost double the number of international flights as the minister, Rabotapi said.
He intended to ask the public protector to investigate “the purpose and necessity of these flights and the appropriateness of this expenditure”, he said.
Public Protector Thuli Madonsela is probing Minister of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries Tina Joemat-Pettersson, who spent R1.6m on chartered flights from 2010.
Rabotapi has asked that Mbalula and Oosthuizen be called to appear before the National Assembly committee on sport to explain the travel expenses. Mbalula and his deputy needed to explain why their travel agents were more deserving recipients of the public money used to pay for the pair’s flights than communities who needed sports facilities, he said.
Mbalula’s spokesman, Paena Galane, said on Monday that the ministry was a “global partner in relation to sport bodies in and outside the country “and participated in the international sporting events, like the rugby and cricket World Cups”.
“Sport, by its nature, is an international event. South Africans participate in international events and we have a duty to give moral support to our athletes when they fly the South African flag,” said Galena.
The flights were also justified because the minister and his deputy served as executive members on international committees, such the World Anti-Doping Agency and the Unesco Fund for the Elimination of Doping in Sport. - Political Bureau