A State witness has admitted to the Durban High Court that she did not take the necessary documents for compliance checks to the eThekwini Municipality compliance monitoring unit for the extension of Durban Solid Waste (DSW) tender contracts.
The State witness, who we cannot name as per court order and who is a contract administrator in the municipality, was being cross-examined by advocate Jay Naidoo in the fraud and money laundering case involving Zandile Gumede, a former mayor of the city, and 21 others.
They are charged with corruption and contravention of the Municipal Finance Management Act and the Municipal Systems Act regarding a R300 million DSW contract.
In February 2018, after the contracts of ILanga la Mahlase PTY (LTD), Uzuzinekele Trading 31 cc, Omphile Thabang Projects, and El Shaddai Holdings Group cc were extended, there was a concern regarding invoices. As a result, El Shaddai Holdings Group cc and Omphile Thabang Projects were not paid.
In a thread of emails that were forwarded to this witness by the fourth accused, Allan Robert Abbu, who was deputy head of the DSW unit, she indicated she would liaise with the manager of compliance and monitoring in case he needed additional information.
Naidoo asked the witness, who testified virtually, if she liaised with the said manager.
“No, I did not. In fact, I don't remember talking to him about this,” the witness replied.
During cross-examination, an official from the compliance and monitoring unit told the court that this witness came to him to ask for a signature to authorise the extension of the contracts.
The witness had told the official, who we cannot name, that the documents for compliance checks were there, but she was in a hurry to get approval at the Bid Adjudication Committee (BAC).
The official said he signed, giving the extension of contracts a green light on condition that if the BAC approved, compliance checks would be done.
He said to this day, he never saw those documents.
The witness, who was told to bring her job description documents on Thursday, said she was seconded to the DSW unit to provide support to supply chain management (SCM) services.
Moreover, during an interview with an investigator from Integrity Forensic Solutions (IFS), she confirmed that she was competent to do this job. Naidoo reminded her, and she said yes.
IFS is a forensic company that investigated this matter.
He asked her hypothetically if she would have a problem at DSW and who she would report it to as she was still part of the SCM unit working in the DSW.
“There was an incident, Mr Naidoo, where I raised a concern with how I was working at DSW. I sent an email to Abbu, Sandile Ngcobo (the fifth accused, who is deputy head of SCM), and my supervisor. There were interventions and solutions. To answer your question,” she said.
The witness reported to Abbu during the time of the extension of contracts and part of her job was to draft tender documents and BAC reports.
In her evidence-in-chief, she had told the court that when they were extending the contracts, Abbu emphasised that it was urgent and that mistakes were made in drafting documents.
The trial continues.