The corruption-busting unit of the eThekwini Municipality, the City’s Integrity and Investigations Unit (CIIU), has been implicated in procurement irregularities and suspected fraudulent conduct.
A report compiled by Masama Consulting details the allegations involving the unit and one specific service provider.
The report, which “The Mercury” has seen, found that the irregularities had cost the City millions of rand. City workers had either failed to ensure full compliance with procurement processes or had worked to subvert those processes.
It also found that some City officials had engaged in misrepresentation to mislead the metro.
The allegations were first brought to the unit by a whistle-blower and the then acting head of the CIIU, Thulani Ntobela, briefed Masama Consulting to conduct an investigation.
The investigation started in December last year and was completed in June this year.
The City declined to comment on the matter but said it was concerned about the leaking of its internal reports.
Among the claims investigated was the payment of millions of rand to a particular service provider.
The report said that about seven invoices valued at R16million were found to be of concern, with some of the invoices being illegitimate and/or non-compliant with supply chain processes. It was also concerning that the particular company was allocated work valued at such a substantial amount.
“Our analysis revealed a significant bias in work allocation in favour of this (service provider). It received R16.1m of the total amount paid of R17.7m.
“This significant difference in allocation raises concerns about suspected unfairness in the procurement process.
Across all periods, this service provider consistently received the majority of the payments,” the report said.
It also found that one City worker approved an invoice of R1.7m when they had no authority to do so.
It was stated that officials in the CIIU had been dishonest in the processing of invoices. It found that the officials had used a new contract as cover to pay invoices for work done prior to that new contract being approved.
“The CIIU relied on the appointment letter of October 27, 2020 when processing an invoice of R1.5m which is dated November 10, 2020 despite the related services being rendered by the service provider in June, July and August 2020.
“The processing and presenting of this invoice for payment constituted suspected fraud as the municipality was misled into processing this payment using the letter of award of October 2020 when the respective services were rendered before October 2020,” it said.
The investigation found that the City had paid for work that was done for another government entity.
The report said this service provider had conducted an investigation into alleged wrongdoing in the Durban Solid Waste Unit.
This matter evolved into a criminal case and was taken over by the SAPS.
In evaluating the time-sheet and other evidence of the work done, the report said, it found that the service provider was billing the City for the work in assisting the police.
“While the police confirmed they had given instruction to the service provider, they were not involved in verifying invoices and time-sheets used for billing by the service provider.
“This was a loophole in verifying and quantifying the work performed by the service provider.
“On the one hand, the CIIU received invoices or time-sheets detailing services that it had no role in supervising.
This left the service provider with an unfettered opportunity to submit bills without any real checks and balances on the work performed,” said the report.
It was found that the police officer who was liaising with the service provider had refused to share his investigation diary and told Masama Consulting to contact his superiors.
The eThekwini Municipality spokesperson, Gugu Sisilana, said the City was not at liberty to divulge details about ongoing investigations as this could jeopardise the integrity of the investigation process.
She added that some of the matters, although they may have been concluded, were sub judice as they related to pending court processes.
“The City is also concerned about the increased leaking of confidential internal investigation reports and documents. We also do not discuss internal employer-employee investigations in the court of public opinion.”
The Mercury