Legislators meet to consider Pillay Commission report

The ad hoc committee on the Pillay Commission report that has been moribund for some two months will meet in the Bhisho Legislature.

The DA in the Legislature introduced a motion in the Legislature in Graaff Reinet earlier this month that was supported by all parties calling for the committee to meet and finish its work and that process will now start on Friday.

The task of the committee is to:

• Consider the process of receiving the report by the Legislature – it was only submitted to the Speaker after a motion demanding this had been passed
• Consider the report against the background that the Premier and Executive must be accountable to the Legislature and must therefore consider the report with due regard to the funds that the Legislature has voted to fund the commission
• Consider the report, the findings and the recommendations thereof, the appropriateness thereof for implementation by the Executive and investigate the steps taken by the Executive to implement the recommendations of the commission and
• Consider the terms of reference of the commission and to what extent they have been complied with.

Is the Pillay Commission probe a dead duck?

After the initial fervour to address the findings of the Pillay Commission report it appears that ANC in the Bhisho Legislature is bent on quietly allowing the matter to die.

The ad hoc commission was appointed in early August to:

Consider the process of receiving the report by the Legislature – it was only submitted to the Speaker after a motion demanding this had been passed

• Consider the report against the background that the Premier and Executive must be accountable to the Legislature and must therefore consider the report with due regard to the funds that the Legislature has voted to fund the commission
• Consider the report, the findings and the recommendations thereof, the appropriateness thereof for implementation by the Executive and investigate the steps taken by the Executive to implement the recommendations of the commission and
• Consider the terms of reference of the commission and to what extent they have been complied with.

The first delay resulted from the tardiness with which some departments provided the information required and then work ground to a halt when the committee’s chairman Phumulo Masualle was appointed to the provincial cabinet.

Since then, although it has a new chairman, the committee has not met and some kind of explanation is going to be demanded by the opposition when the Legislature gathers in Graaff-Reinet this week for its annual “taking the Legislature to the people”.

Probe into Pillay commission back on track

The ad hoc committee of the Bhisho Legislature that will look at aspects of the Pillay Commission report is back on track with a new chairman Alfred Mzi, following the appointment of the original chairman Phumulo Masualle as MEC for Finance, Economic Development and Environmental Affairs.

The committee had initially been scheduled to report back at the end of last month but must now do so by October 24 when the Legislature will meet for the next time.

The task of the committee is to:

• Consider the process of receiving the report by the Legislature – it was only submitted to the Speaker after a motion demanding this had been passed
• Consider the report against the background that the Premier and Executive must be accountable to the Legislature and must therefore consider the report with due regard to the funds that the Legislature has voted to fund the commission
• Consider the report, the findings and the recommendations thereof, the appropriateness thereof for implementation by the Executive and investigate the steps taken by the Executive to implement the recommendations of the commission and
• Consider the terms of reference of the commission and to what extent they have been complied with.

In addition, the committee must look at the Eastern Cape Commissions Act and assess whether it should be amended “to make provision for improved transparency and accountability in the appointment and terms of reference of and reporting by commissions”.

Big heads set to roll in Bhisho

Eastern Cape Health superintendent Lawrence Boya who is to be charged in terms of the provisions of the Public Finance Management Act (PFMA) with financial misconduct need not feel alone as he is to be joined by three other heads of department as the Bhisho Legislature’s standing committee on public accounts gets tough.

Heads of the department of Education, Social Development and Economic Development and Environmental Affairs are all facing criminal charges in terms of the PFMA and once the legislature adopts the report of the standing committee they will be charged. Joining them will be the head of the Eastern Cape Liquor Board, Advocate Naledi Burwana-Bisiwe.

Chairman of the committee Zingisa Mkabile told the Legislature at the start of debate on the SCOPA report that the findings generally “point to the fundamental challenge of lack of proper control systems, monitoring and requisite policy implementation and evaluation systems which generally plague the provincial public administration”.

With regard to the heads of department and head of the Liquor Board, SCOPA concluded that they had failed to convince the committee that there was “no wilful or element of neglect” in their failure to account properly for the department’s financial affairs.

Health head in trouble

The Eastern Cape director-general of Health Lawrence Boya is in trouble.

The Bhisho Legislature’s standing committee on Public Accounts says in a report tabled today that he was provided with an opportunity “to explain gross mismanagement in his department” but that his responses were “inadequate”.

The committee states that taking into account the “significance of the matters reported by the Auditor-General” Boya had failed to account for his department’s financial affairs for the 2007/08 financial year and should be charged with financial misconduct in terms of Section 81 of the Public Finance Management Act.

This followed, the committee states, because he had failed to convince them that there was “no wilful or element of neglect” in his failure to account properly for the department’s financial affairs.

If the Legislature adopts the report, Boya will be the first official to be charged under the provisions of the PFMA.

Do unto others ...

Got to thinking around Nosimo Balindlela’s unhappiness about the way that her “forced removal” was handled and particularly the fact that the news was in the media before Luthuli House informed her she could return to her farm in Stutterheim.

That would have brought some wry chuckles from some of the people she fired during the four years she was Premier.

Take Johnny Makgato, for example, who was initially appointed Finance MEC in 2004 in Balindlela’s first cabinet but before he was even sworn in received a note stating that his services were not required when Balindlela was forced to retain Enoch Godongwana.

And then Godongwana who was at a meeting when a “flunkey” arrived with a terse note telling him that he had been fired. And in a foretaste of what was to eventually come in the Pillay Commission, the statement issued at the time said:

“The Honourable Premier, Mrs Nosimo Balindlela, wishes to announce the removal of Mr Enoch Godongwana as the MEC for Finance with immediate effect.

“This action is taken in the light of the Executive Council decision last week that an investigation into the provincial finances be instituted.”

Take that Enoch!

Not to mention big Andre de Wet who served in the provincial cabinet with Billy Nel who had defeated him in the 1989 election in East London for the House of Assembly and who was, depending on how charitable one is feeling, either the hatchet man of the Balindlela administration or its “useful idiot”.

Having created general havoc in the provincial parastatals from which some have still to recover, but removed as many perceived enemies of the administration as possible De Wet found himself out in the cold. The telltale signs were there when Balindlela refused all his requests for meetings and in due course the axe fell.

Put in that perspective does Balindlela really have any reason to gripe?

Pillay report: Questions remain

Pillay yet again.

For reasons best known to somebody in the Legislature it was decided not to distribute Chapter 2 of the Pillay Commission report, authored by Judge Ronnie Pillay (pictured), that interestingly enough is dated December 1 2006 the first pages of which were leaked to the media and contain allegations to which those accused have not had the opportunity to reply.

That has now been rectified.

No explanation has yet been provided, however, as to why the Premier sat on the report for some 18 months and the question being asked is whether it was not being held back as “dry powder” for use at the right moment.

The ad hoc committee examining the report and that is considering among other things whether the commission complied with its mandate has requested an extension of time to complete its deliberations.

Committee chairman Phumulo Masualle says information is still waited from departments and he has now been given to August 26 to report when the Legislature is scheduled to sit again.

And Pillay on Coega ...

Yet more from the Pillay Commission

Another of Judge Ronnie Pillay’s apparent dislikes is the Coega Project. Among the lengthy list of recommendations contained in Volume 8 is the exhortation to the Eastern Cape not to invest further monies in the Coega Development Corporation at the expense of departments which provide social services to the citizens of the Province.

“If the CDC requires further finance, then Province should seek the same from National Government by means of a conditional grant and/or from Provincial surplus.

“Means to be reimbursed by the Department of Trade and Industry and/or CDC for the R1 billion already invested (plus interest) should be initiated or the Provincial Government should take complete control of CDC.”

• Coega announced earlier this week that six auto component manufacturers were in the process of concluding investment deals worth more than R1 billion with the Coega Development Corporation that will result in a total of 2 530 people employed between July 2008 and mid 2010. The factories are to be located in the Nelson Mandela Bay Logistics Park (NMBLP) in Uitenhage.

Pillay Commission under scrutiny

The Pillay Commission report, tabled in the Legislature today, is itself the study of a probe by a special ad hoc committee chaired by Phumulo Masualle who will take over as MEC for Finance and Economic Development on Friday.

The ad hoc committee, among other things will “consider the terms of reference of the commission and to what extent they have been complied with” and must also consider the report “with due regard to the funds that the Legislature has voted to fund the commission”.

The committee is supposed to report by July 31 but it is likely to ask for an extension when it meets tomorrow morning.

There were indications yesterday that the ad hoc committee may question the credibility of the commission report and ask questions around its appointment.

• Full report in The Herald tomorrow

Eastern Cape premier promises corruption report

Eastern Cape Premier Nosimo Balindlela has delivered a rambling 40-minute reply to the debate on her Policy Speech succeeding in avoiding all the contentious points that had been raised during two hours of debate apart from saying that she was “committed” to bringing the report of the Pillay Commission to the House.

In addition, she apologised for not attending committee meetings saying she had had other duties.

Had she been there, she said, she would have been able to assist the committee.

Balindlela said that despite the fact that in 2007/08 more than 1 000 cases had been sorted out as far as litigation was concerned “we still have a long way to go”, adding “if you have any advice you can give us because it is long drawn out process.

Where is the Pillay report?

Premier Nosimo Balindlela came under attack from the African Peoples Convention this afternoon, with MPL Zingisa Mkabile stating that the failure of the Premier to release the Pillay Commission report into corruption was “unacceptable.

“Where is that report? We voted money for it. It really borders on disrespect for this House that this and the many other reports have not been tabled in this Legislature.

“We are not going to see the reports and the comrades on the right (the ANC) are going to keep quiet. It is a serious situation.”

Calling Balindlela’s administration “a lame duck” Mkabile said it was not surprising that there was no service delivery in the Eastern Cape “because it is clear that the heart does not function”.

As far as the branding of the province was concerns, Mkabile said if the Eastern Cape continued to perform the way it was then this would be “spin-doctoring – there is no point in talking about branding until we have resolved the problems connected with education, health and many other areas”.