Ramaphosa’s relief fund corruption crackdown more than just blowing smoke?

President Cyril Ramaphosa’s public instruction to the Special Investigating Unit (SIU) to investigate and pinpoint any corrupt activities surrounding Covid-19 relief funds might only be an attempt to build credibility, but this could come at a cost and impact other investigations, an expert has warned.

On Thursday, Ramaphosa signed a proclamation authorising the SIU to investigate any “unlawful or improper conduct in the procurement of any goods, works and services during or related to the national state of disaster in any state institution.”

In his latest national address, he said his government was increasingly being alerted of allegations of mismanagement and corruption around food parcel relief and inflated prices of personal protective equipment (PPE) and goods required to curb the Covid-19 pandemic.

Investigations will include allegations that the Gauteng health department procured PPE at inflated prices from Royal Bhaca Projects, a company where Madzikane Thandisiwe Diko, the husband of Ramaphosa’s spokesperson Khusela Diko, was listed as the sole director.

“We knew we wanted it to fall within this proclamation. We have already started and did a secondment with the Gauteng department of health and sent people to investigate. Now that the proclamation is out, we will add this onto it and investigate fully. The proclamation gives more power than the secondment,” said SIU spokesperson Kaizer Kganyago.

He said allegations of the Eastern Cape’s OR Tambo District Municipality irregularly spending R1.4 billion would also be probed.

Most of the complaints investigated are around the mismanaged distribution of food parcels during the lockdown.

“Our boss has already spoken to the provincial heads to start dealing with those that are in their areas of work because we need to report to the President in six weeks to be able to give him an update of where we are. We are going to get to the bottom of it. We are now able to do real time investigations. The positive is that we are able to go immediately and deal with issues before any payments are done. If we find a contract is irregular, we don’t have to recover the money but we can stop the money from being paid,” Kganyago explained.

Ramaphosa’s attempts at projecting a firm hand, however, would go a long way toward bolstering his own credibility, as it would be easier to investigate these incidents since they have only just occurred in recent months.

Institute for Security Studies (ISS) researcher Gareth Newham said the strategy of the President requiring updates from law enforcement agencies every six weeks will pressurise them to perform.

“Usually they [work at a certain] pace, but if the head of the Hawks, SIU, and National Prosecuting Authority (NPA) have to report to him of what they are doing, they will put a lot of pressure on investigators. They will be more focused to ensure they are able to report positively. I think it’s one way to build credibility,” Newham said.

The President’s strategy was, however, risky as there was limited capacity in the justice system to investigate, and such probes would be taking time and resources away from state capture investigations, he said.

“They will now be redirecting their focus on these new cases … and delay state capture investigations further. Even though there are some benefits, it might also have some costs. We will have to see how this pans out, but other cases might take longer to finalise.”

rorisangk@citizen.co.za

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