Minister Sisulu evades questions on political interference and conflict of interest at Amatola Water Board
27 May 2020
At Tuesday’s meeting of the Standing Committee on Public Accounts (SCOPA), the Minister of Human Settlements, Water and Sanitation, Lindiwe Sisulu and her Acting Director-General, both avoided answering questions posed to them by the Democratic Alliance (DA) about a potential conflict of interest in the appointment of Outsourced Risk and Compliance Assessment (ORCA) and Open Water Advanced Risk Solutions (OWARS) to perform an investigation into the financial affairs of the Amatola Water Board. The companies have also been tasked with conducting lifestyle audits into the previous and current executive management of the Amatola Board, including the CEO and Exco Team.
The DA referred these allegations to SCOPA last week Friday for discussion and for the Minister to account to Parliament for the apparent conflict of interest and possible political interference in tender processes at Amatole. Following Minister Sisulu’s inability to answer attempts to hold her to account on Tuesday, the DA has again requested a follow-up SCOPA meeting with the Minister in order to ensure that she doesn’t run around these questions again.
As revealed by DA last week, the alleged conflict of interest is that the director of OWARS, Reavell Rhodes N’Kondo, shares a company interest with Lungile Bomela, the director of Empowering Water Solutions (EWS). EWS is at the centre of allegations that Minister Sisulu apparently favoured them for certain tenders at Amatola, including sand water extraction technology. Both N’Kondo and Bomela are directors of ELF Foundation, a nonprofit company from the province of the Free State.
Instead of answering the DA’s questions on the seemingly clear conflict of interest and her apparent political interference – she referred to Section 45.2 of the Water Service Act which determines that the Minister may appoint a person to investigate the affairs or financial position of a water board.