DA requests formal summons of Mokonyane after bunking today

7 June 2017

The DA will request the Water and Sanitation Portfolio Committee to formally summon Water and Sanitation Minister, Nomvula Mokonyane, and the Water and Sanitation Director General (DG), Dan Mashitisho, after a committee meeting was cancelled because they failed to show up.

The Committee Chairperson, Mlungisi Johnson, can formally issue the summons on behalf of the Committee, with the committee's backing.

Should the Minister and DG ignore the summons, they will be “liable to a fine or to imprisonment for a period not exceeding 12 months or to both the fine and the imprisonment” in accordance with the Powers, Privileges and Immunities of Parliament and Provincial Legislatures Act.

Today’s Committee meeting was vitally important as the very serious governance issues at the Mhlathuze Water Board were to be discussed.

In November 2016, the Pietermaritzburg High Court ruled Minister Mokonyane’s decision to extend the Board’s term beyond 28 February 2015 was unlawful, invalid and set it aside.

Yet while the Minister complied with the ruling and dissolved the board in 2016, according to the Board’s annual report, the Board was paid a lucrative R3 million in 2015 and over R3 million in 2016 despite being unlawful.

It is no coincidence that Ms Dudu Myeni - of SAA infamy - chaired this Board, whose term was extended unlawfully.

This is a flagrant abuse of public money and the DA believes that the former board members should pay back every cent because, as per the Court ruling, their role at the time was invalid in law.

Moreover, the Court also held that the Board’s decision to pursue disciplinary action against Sibusiso Makhanya, the suspended Board CEO, was invalid and set it aside.

It is shocking that while the water authority is still in the process of constituting a new board, the acting CEO is the accounting authority while the water authority does not currently have a Board. The acting CEO effectively has carte blanche, unsupervised.

It is absolutely imperative that the new Board swiftly deal with the issue of the suspended CEO and that they ensure that Dudu Myeni does not feature in the process.

Mokonyane clearly has no respect for Parliament’s oversight role and must now be forced to do her job and account to the Committee for the failures at the Mhlathuze Water Board.

Issued by Tarnia Baker, DA Shadow Deputy Minister of Water and Sanitation, 7 June 2017