The SACP Brian Bunting District [Cape Metro] leaders met on Tuesday, 13th March 2012. Issues discussed included the outcomes of the successful alliance meeting held on Sunday, 11th March 2012 in Khayelitsha, preparations for the SACP Provincial Council to be held on Sunday, 18th March 2012, and the District Council of SACP to be held on the 31st March 2012.
ON THE SUCCESSFUL ALLIANCE [ANC,SACP, COSATU, SANCO] MEETING
As the SACP we welcome, the successful hosting of this long outstanding meeting as a milestone in our quest for a strong alliance capable of taking forward the national democratic revolution. We congratulate all who attended.
In our view, our primary constituency, the working class and the poor, must be happy about these developments in the Cape Metro area characterized by deep inequality, poverty and unemployment. On the other side, Patricia De Lille must be worried.
CORRUPTION IN THE CITY OF CAPE TOWN
The South African Communist Party (SACP) in the Brian Bunting [Cape Metro] District extremely welcomes the MFMA Audit Report of 2010-11, which was done in the City of Cape Town. The SACP, believes the findings of irregular expenditures in the City of Cape Town, expose the falsity of the DA's claims to clean governance. To us, the terminology "irregular expenditures" is an understatement: this is pure and simple corruption and the abuse of public funds.
The Auditor General's Report states that within the City of Cape Town's Procurement and Contract Management there have been serious fruitless, irregular and wasteful expenditures and material losses. Tenders have been awarded to families and friends of employees in service of the City of Cape Town.
The findings of the report were as follows:
- Awards have been made to persons or entities whose members were in the service of the municipality and the providers failed to declare. This amounted to R1 275 367.
- Awards have been made to persons or entities whose directors, members and/or principal shareholders were in the service of other state institutions and the providers failed to declare. This amounted to R 9 376 612.
- Awards have been made to prohibited suppliers, worth R 5 271 566.
- Contracts were not advertised for full period required. This amounted to R 33 362 982.
- No declarations of interest were obtained for certain commodity types below R 200 000, amounting to R 36 771 982.
- Awards have been made without following a competitive bidding process, which amounted to R 9 810 646.
This report confirms what we have always argued: that DA's serves the interests of a few at the expense of the needs of the majority, working people and the poor. This neo-liberal agenda is undermining the gains of the South African Liberation Movement, which is to free its people from the evils of the Apartheid.
This corrupt expenditure of R 191 737 470.00 conceals unquantified value in terms of poor value for money, under-performance and failure to deliver quality services. Correcting this will cost further public funds. While relatives, friends and associates of City Council employees cream off handsome profits, the citizens of Cape Town and particularly those in greatest need - those in informal settlements, those without adequate services, the poor, the unemployed and the marginalised - are being short changed and denied the service to which they are entitled.
At the same time honest traders fail to obtain tender awards they qualify for because the connected few corruptly monopolise work from the Council. Instead of public funds being properly managed to ensure maximum benefit for the City's people, through value for money and quality services delivered, funds are squandered to satisfy the greed of the few.
We of the SACP also ask, how much of this work really needs to be outsourced by the tender process in the first place? Why is the Council not using public funds to create decent jobs and deliver these services itself? Are qualified staff having an easy ride at our expense, while putting the work they should be doing out to tender to their friends and family members - and paying handsomely from the public purse for them to do it? This is the neo-liberal agenda the DA sells as "the equal opportunity society": a system where money is collected from the many and distributed to the few.
As the SACP, we are therefore calling for the Public Protector to look into these matters with urgency and seriousness. If criminal behavior is identified, those implicated at all levels must face the full weight of the law. Furthermore, we call upon the people of the City of Cape Town to demand a full service delivery report which will enable them to see the truth about the DA and its failure to fairly and effectively serve their interests.
The SACP believes that the City of Cape Town is an important site of struggle in South Africa, where as a result of long standing colonial thinking, certain powerful and well connected interests assume they are entitled to monopolise public funds and projects for their private benefit. If this is not defeated, the people of the Cape Metro will never be free and the inequalities will exist forever, under the leadership of DA.
We will be embarking on demonstrations to reject the corrupt government of the DA which shields and feeds these selfish interests. Its neo-liberal wings will be clipped so it and its cronies no longer fly over our City.
Statement issued by SACP Brian Bunting District [Cape Metro] Officials, March 14 2012
Click here to sign up to receive our free daily headline email newsletter
