THE KwaZulu-Natal department of health was swindled out of more than R31 million in dodgy tender dealings according to a recent report by the Public Protector.
The 129-page report details how various high ranking officials in the department conspired to award a R52 million tender to a company that was established two weeks prior to the tender going for auction.
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The tender related to four mobile hospital units, which were initially supposed to lessen the burden on hospitals, especially in rural areas.
After a bidding process, two companies, Mobile Satellite Technologies and Mzansi Life Care were invited by the department to submit their revised proposals.
MST submitted that they would supply the mobile units at a cost of R347 415 per month while Mzansi Life Care would supply them at 1 458 905 per month for 26 months.
The tender was awarded to Mzansi Life Care, signed off by former Head of Department Sibongile Zungu and former chairperson of the Bid Adjudication Committees & Bid Award Committees and Chief Financial Officer, Mashaka Ravhura.
Documents showed that Mzansi Life Care had been established on 29 May 2012, 12 days before the tender was advertised.
On 1 March, 2016, Mzansi Life Care billed the department R31 million for four mobile units.
The public protector would later find that only two of the trucks for the mobile units were delivered and that as of 18 September 2017, they were no longer operational.
Despite this, the department extended its contract to lease the mobile units from Mzansi Life Care for a further three years between August 2013 and August 2016.
There were also other lease extensions which the public protector found to be improper. In her findings, the public protector concluded that the department improperly procured the mobile home units and incurred irregular expenditure.
She also found that the CFO (Rhavura) and HOD (Zungu) were guilty of improper conduct in their duties of processing the payments.
Although Rhavura and Zungu are no longer employed by the department, the public protector has asked the MEC for Health, Sinegugu Simelane, to draw up a plan outlining disciplinary measures against them and how she plans to recoup the money.
On Thursday, the Democratic Alliance in KZN, formally opened criminal charges against all the people implicated in the report at Durban Central SAPS.
Along with the DA, the Inkatha Freedom Party had initially written to the public protector in 2015 raising the alarm and calling for an investigation into the irregular tender.
The MEC has 30 days to make her representations to the public protector.
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