Chairperson, hon M C Dikgale and hon members, evidence continues to emerge implicating officials who illegally benefit from the government's housing programme. In the main, two forms of illegality have been detected:
Firstly, we have officials who are benefiting from procurement or tender processes. These officials either fail to declare their interests in companies bidding for government work or they, in fact, influence the outcomes of procurement processes by favouring companies in which they have a direct interest or companies that benefit their family or friends.
There are also reported instances of moonlighting, which is illegal if permission to do remunerative work outside of government has not been requested and granted by the relevant accounting officer.
The second category of illegality manifests itself when government officials illegally take ownership of government houses meant for the underprivileged. Recent statistics provided by the Special Investigations Unit, SIU, in the Department of Human Settlements shows that more than 800 government employees who have illegally benefited from the provision of government houses have been successfully prosecuted, leading to the recovery of approximately R20 million.
Close to a thousand cases are currently going through disciplinary processes. At local government level, about 123 municipal employees have been successfully prosecuted, leading to the recovery of more than R3 million.
This demonstrates that there are hundreds of public officials who illegally benefit from the housing programme.
The Department of Human Settlements currently has additional evidence on the provision of government houses that requires further investigation. Thus it has launched a national housing audit to examine, review and analyse the chronic problems in the delivery of houses. Included in what the audit must achieve is the facilitation of criminal action; the institution of civil action; and the naming and shaming of people, both inside and outside government, who are illegally benefiting from the provision of government houses.
More importantly, this initiative will help government to uncover the extent to which companies owned by government officials and employees have illegally benefited from the provision of government houses.
Our position is very clear: corruption, irrespective of who commits it, will not be tolerated. We want to reiterate that nobody will be spared if found guilty of an offence that necessitates instituting criminal or civil action. I thank you.
Chairperson, I want to ask the Deputy President whether there are any national norms and standards that prohibit public servants who have companies from tendering in government projects. If so, what are the consequences for deviation?
Chairperson, I missed the last part of the question. Could the hon member please restate it?
The last part of the question deals with the consequences for deviation. If there are norms and standards that prohibit public servants who have companies from tendering in government projects, what are the consequences for those public servants who do not abide by such norms and standards?
Chairperson, at the moment there is no legislation which debars public servants from participating in the tender process, other than the Provincial Finance Management Act. At local government level, the Municipal Finance Management Act directs municipalities to craft regulations that would debar councillors and their spouses from tendering or conducting any form of business or trade with that particular municipality.
Unfortunately, this is one of the occasions where a good intention has not been actualised because the mechanism to follow through on it is not in place. Many of the municipalities have not actually come up with such regulations. Of course, in practice, nothing stops councillors from one municipality who have companies from directing their own companies to tender for contracts with another municipality in another province. These are reciprocated, as it were. It is these insidious activities that the review would also look at, to see how we can ensure that we stamp out this practice of insider trading, because that is essentially what it is.
It is of course, by law, an offence to tamper with tender processes. If it is found that an official who stands to benefit, or whose relatives stand to benefit, tampered with tender processes, charges can be preferred against such a person and, once convicted, their assets can be impounded. So those would be the consequences.
Chairperson, I refer to a communiqu from the Minister for the Public Service and Administration which states that they are currently looking into having spouses of public officials declaring their assets as well. Is this process still ongoing or is there an outcome already?
Hon member, is the relevant Minister not maybe better placed to answer that question? On the other hand, hon Deputy President, if you are prepared to answer the question, please do go ahead.
Chairperson, at the moment I am not in a position to give a correct reply to that question.
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