The former acting HOD of the Mpumalanga Department of Education, Jabulani Rolland Nkosi, has been acquitted of the fraud and corruption charges he faced, involving procurement of personal protective equipment (PPE) to the value of R21.9m.
Nkosi, who is now the chief director in the Department of Health, was arrested in February 2022, the same day of the State of the Province Address, which he was part of. He was granted R10 000 bail and had been in and out of court since.
His trial, which lasted over a year, saw the Auditor-General citing that they found no wrongdoing by Nkosi as an accounting officer during the purchase of PPE, as all the purchases were delivered.
Some of the people who testified in the trial included the education HOD, Lucy Moyane, who confirmed the delivered purchases to the court. This led to Magistrate Deon van Rooyen acquitting Nkosi on Thursday June 13.
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Van Rooyen told the court that according to all the witnesses, all purchased goods needed by the department for schools were delivered and the procurement system was followed, even though the processes were done under duress and on an emergency basis at the time, due to the state of disaster during the Covid-19 period.
The Mpumalanga National Prosecuting Authority’s (NPA) spokesperson, Monica Nyuswa, confirmed Nkosi’s acquittal and said they are awaiting the transcripts of the case to study the judgment.
Nkosi, however, blamed political influence on the case, citing that the aim was to embarrass him and to prevent him from contesting the position of HOD in the Department of Education.
“You will understand that we were in a state of disaster as a country during that period, and that all procurement processes were not done normally, but on the emergency basis published by National Treasury. While the Special Investigation Unit was still investigating some of the procurements made around that time, I learnt from the Hawks that I was to be arrested. That arrest was to be carried out on the day of the State of the Province Address, and on the red carpet. People lied and used police resources to embarrass me, saying I stole money or conducted myself improperly during the procurement processes. But the court found all that was done, was done correctly,” said Nkosi shortly after his acquittal.
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Since his arrest, Nkosi had always maintained that the case had been politically motivated, since he had ambitions of taking up the role he had been acting in on a full-time basis.
“The plot was to stop me from being an HOD, because anyone facing such charges can’t be hired,” said Nkosi.
