Municipality dodges grader questions

ABAQULUSI Municipality is not known for caring about openness and transparency. Readers of the Vryheid Herald will know that numerous times, in fact invariably, articles concerning the municipality end with the words “the municipality failed to respond to questions at the time of going to press”.

In February, the Vryheid Herald learned that the municipality had entered into an agreement with a company called Aqua Transport and Plant Hire, for the hire of four road graders for a period of three years. The Invitation to Tender for this contract was published on August 15, 2014, and the contract was signed on December 5, 2014.

According to the contract, “the municipality must pay the service provider the amount of R24,914,365.74” – in effect R25-million.

On February 19, the Vryheid Herald asked the Mayor, the Acting Municipal Manager, the Media Liaison Officer and the Municipal Records Office to respond to certain questions regarding the contract:

“Please provide us with the rationale behind this agreement, presumably as determined by the motivating department which would seem to be Engineering.

“Please also provide us with a schedule, in the form of a daily breakdown, as to where exactly those four road graders have been working since the agreement was signed.

“Please also, provide us with the planned schedule for each of the four road graders for the next year.

“Please also advise us who it is who is tasked with checking on the progress of the work done, how this checking is carried out.

“Where currently are the four road graders?”

An acknowledgment was received from the Acting Personal Assistant to the Acting Municipal Manager, saying that the enquiry had been forwarded to the Media Liaison Officer. He phoned the Herald to say that the relevant and responsible person in Engineering was on leave, and only after his return would the matter be responded to.

It wasn’t.

A reminder was sent to the same offices on March 4, adding a request for details of any payments made to Aqua Transport since the inception of the contract.

The following was received from NN Sibisi, the Acting Municipal Manager (who also signed the contract with Aqua Transport):

“You are required to comply with Access to Information Act before any information is released to your office.”

NN Sibisi was asked on what grounds the newspaper was being instructed to “comply” with the Act. No response was received.

The municipality has, in effect, deliberately made it difficult for the newspaper to get the information to pass on to its readers, the citizens of AbaQulusi Municipality.

The Promotion of Access to Information Act is a mechanism which allows individuals and organisations to get access to public (and sometimes private) documents. The Act is usually invoked when the documents in question are regarded to have some degree of sensitivity.

The contract between the municipality and Aqua Transport is a public document in the public domain. It has no sensitivity.

In effect, for the municipality to insist that the newspaper now make its enquiries in terms of the Act would seem like nothing more than a delaying tactic.

The graders in question are apparently in AbaQulusi. Via Facebook, the community was asked to report sighting of graders, and various people did, although it is not known if the graders seen were municipal graders, belonged to the KZN Roads Department or were the hired graders.

But who determines where those graders work each day; who checks that they do. The municipality is a vast area from Blood River to Louwsburg, from Kambula to Gluckstadt – who checks the graders’ tachometers (do they have tachometers?). Who sees that the jobs are done satisfactorily, who signs off the job cards, monitors any standing time, ensures that the graders are not doing private jobs in remote locations at public expense? How could it possible be known that in three years those four graders would still be required, and for what?

AbaQulusi residents, who are the people ultimately paying the R25-million, might well ask, “What is the municipality hiding?”