Following the front page article in the Sunday Times on 1 March, it was revealed that the Minister of Labour, Mildred Oliphant had allegedly attempted to keep secret a forensic audit report which revealed that an exorbitant amount of money had been skimmed from the government- funded Nedlac labour council.
Most notably, one of Oliphant’s advisers Herbert Mkhize is said to have spent more than R1 million.
The audit report conducted by AFCA and Partners was also obtained by the Rosebank Killarney Gazette.
It indicated that Mkhize used Nedlac funds to finance, among other things, luxury car hire, excessive shopping sprees and “informally authorised overseas trips to Rome, New York and Moscow [amounting to] R133 092,68.”
The report also implicates Umesh Dulabh, the former chief financial officer of Nedlac, who along with Mkhize, used the Nedlac petrol card for personal use to the amount of R186 000.
The report noted that Dulabh’s Nedlac diners club showed cash withdrawals of R36 350, The audit firm believes that some of this money was used to finance the practice of unauthorised interest free loans.
Subsequent to the publication of the audit report, Ollis posed written questions to Oliphant requesting information on how many officials in the Department of Labour were currently under suspension, and how many of the suspended employees were still receiving salaries.
In her reply, Oliphant said there were currently 16 government officials within the ministry of labour who were on suspension with full pay.
The DA calculated that this was costing the taxpayer R5.2 million to date.
“In terms of the Disciplinary Code and Procedures for the Public Service, prompt investigations must be conducted and disciplinary hearings must be held within 60 days from the date of suspension,” said Ollis. “This is clearly not happening, and with a public sector wage bill amounting to a staggering R439 billion per year, government must do all it can to mitigate such unnecessary expense.”
One of the suspended employees is advocate Nkahloleng Phasha who was the chief director of legal services in the labour ministry.
Phasha has been on suspension since October 2011, with a monthly salary of R82 346.
“His on-going suspension has to date cost the state a massive R3 376 186,” said Ollis.
“It is unacceptable that ordinary tax paying South Africans are footing the bill for a host of suspended employee’s salaries, placing an unnecessary strain on the public purse.”
Ian Ollis oversees the DA’s demarcated Sandton-Alex constituency which includes wards 90 and 117 in the Rosebank Killarney Gazette’s distribution area.
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