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Thulas Nxesi. Picture: Deaan Vivier/Foto24
The public works department has learnt from Nkandla and had already
implemented all the remedial actions of the Public Protector, Minister Thulas
Nxesi told Parliament yesterday.
Delivering his budget vote, Nxesi said that to prevent a repeat of
Nkandla, a turnaround strategy was also in place with a “zero tolerance of fraud
and corruption”.
Nxesi became minister in October 2011 amid a growing scandal around
irregular spending at the president’s homestead in KwaZulu-Natal.
Outlining the remedial steps that had been taken, Nxesi said acts
of criminality had been forwarded to the Special Investigating Unit (SIU),
officials had been subjected to internal disciplinary processes and a civil
claim had been instituted against the principal contractor – architect Minenhle
Makhanya – to recover about R150 million. In addition, tenders above R50 million
could no longer be approved by regional offices.
Questioned earlier during a media briefing as to whether the
minister should be reprimanded following the Constitutional Court ruling on
Nkandla, his deputy Jeremy Cronin said that the Public Protector had not made a
finding against Nxesi.
“Any unbiased reading of the Public Protector’s report would
clarify that this minister was not around,” he said, adding that the Public
Protector was pointing to his predecessor, Geoff Doidge.
Expanding on the actions taken, Cronin said that the next court
date for the disciplinary process of 12 officials was on May 22. The court was
due to decide whether the media would be granted access or not.
Cronin said that the Public Protector, Thuli Madonsela, had
“thanked” the department for implementing the findings of her 2014 report,
Secure in Comfort.
Her findings were confirmed by the Constitutional Court to be
binding last month. President Jacob Zuma, who has failed to comply with her
findings for two years, has now been given a specified time to pay back a
portion of the money for non-security upgrades as outlined in Madonsela’s
report.
Cronin said public works had already implemented the actions
“because we agreed with them”.
He said the Public Protector’s findings were similar to those that
were made earlier by a departmental task team and the Special investigating
Unit.
“We didn’t wait for the Constitutional Court to decide whether they
were binding or not. They made good sense. So we proceeded with them and had
begun them even before the Public Protector released her report.”
“We learnt many lessons [from Nkandla], not of the confessional
kind, but of the order that we inherited a department of public works in serious
distress. We have initiated a turnaround process,” said Cronin.
At the briefing, Nxesi did not answer directly whether he was in
support of Police Minister Nathi Nhleko’s widely discredited report into Nkandla
– which second-guessed the Public Protector and absolved Zuma of all
accountability. Nxesi was present at the briefing when Nhleko cleared Zuma.
In 2013, Nxesi was quoted as saying that there was no evidence that
public funds were spent to build the private residence of the president. At the
briefing, Cronin disputed this, saying Nxesi had never said the president was
not liable in any way.
