No work, R2m pay for VBS-linked manager

A bankrupt Limpopo municipality has spent nearly R2 million on the salary of a suspended manager because the municipality’s legal team had not been able to crack the case for nearly two years.

The manager, Minah Maredi, was suspended in November 2018 for allegedly wrongfully investing R40 million into the now defunct VBS Mutual Bank (Venda Building Society).

The investment was later found by the council to be illegal and against the prescripts of the Municipal Finance Management Act. It was also found to have been against warning from the National Treasury, which cautioned municipalities not to invest municipal funds into a mutual bank.

The Citizen understands Maredi and the municipality’s chief finance officer George Mapheto were given a letter of intention to suspend by the municipality during a special council sitting of 1 November 2018.

Their responses were forwarded to council on 14 November 2018 and the matter was deferred. On 27 November 2018, the council resolved to put Maredi and Mapheto on precautionary suspension.

They were suspended with full pay. But that did not sit well with Maredi, who later challenged the suspension.

The application was later dismissed with costs by the Labour Court. Mapheto allegedly resigned soon after the suspension.

Maredi was appointed as Elias Motsoaledi mayor in 2012. She has allegedly been receiving an annual salary package of about R1.4 million a year, excluding bonuses.

It is understood that since her suspension, the legal team on the case invoiced the municipality R1.1 million for November 2019 to March 2019. Councillors fear the bill may skyrocket.

The Bolsheviks party is the opposition in the Elias Motsoaledi municipality and its acting general-secretary Seun Mogotji yesterday said: “A number of municipalities have long completed the disciplinary process with the municipal managers and chief financial officers on VBS-related charges, but there is seemingly no commitment from this municipality to deal with the matter expeditiously.”

Mogotji said the municipality was bankrupt. He said the council was currently failing to fix infrastructure machineries, such as TLB, graders and copy machines. Contacted for comment, Mayor Julia Mathebe admitted the debacle had dragged and promised it was nearing completion.

– news@citizen.co.za

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