Are We Ever Going to Win the Battle Against Corruption

ARE WE EVER GOING TO WIN THE BATTLE AGAINST CORRUPTION

In his inauguration speech the President of the republic singled out the CCMA as one of the best institutions in South Africa. Ironically we had alerted the Auditor general’s office who was conducting an audit at the CCMA of alleged corrupt and fraudulent activities with regard to procurement. We have attached a copy of the document we send to the auditor general titledtravel report. The password to the document is aveshan1.

Most of the fruitless expenditure and unauthorized expenditure that we alerted the auditor general to is indeed reported as fruitless expenditure in the CCMA annual report for the year ending 2008/2009. These expenditures are reported on pages 34(8), 35(12), 64(26), 68(33) of the annual report.

What is more surprising is the fact that more significant alleged financial irregularities and unauthorized expenditures that were brought to Phakamisa in the Auditor Generals office are not featured anywhere in the report. This relates to a contract given to Pysbergate to upgrade the CCMA website. This company got a tender of over 4 million and it did not follow due process, what is most surprising about this company is the fact that it is paid in foreign currency while it is a proudly South African company. This company is linked to one of the General Managers. Lastly the work done by the company and the tender amount it received do not tally. It can never cost so much money to upgrade an existing website.

Another money spinner is Thabiso new technologies; this company was given a tender to supply printers to the CCMA they were also supposed to maintain these printers. This company is a middle man, it got a contract and it then sub contracted Nashua to supply printers and now Nashua is also servicing the machines and Thabiso is doing nothing except to collect a fat cheque. This was never part of the contract. The amount approved for the tender had been far exceeded for the year under review. The amount paid to Thabiso far exceeds the amount that was paid to the previous company Canon. To show that there is collusion between the CFO and Thabiso the following took place.

Thabiso got points for locality whilst it is a company based in Limpopo.
The SCM became aware that the Gauteng address given by Thabiso was incorrect and reported this to CFO, but nothing was done.
Thabiso is owned by a single white male but received BEE points.
The contract between CCMA and Canon was prematurely cancelled by the CFO and ended up facing litigation just to make way for Thabiso.
Thabiso is a Polokoane based company(hometown of CFO)
Thabiso is 3 times more expensive than Canon but it was approved.

The CCMA is currently running 2 current accounts one with Nedbank and a new one with Standard bank. The cost of maintaining 2 current accounts was unnecessary for the CCMA. No authorization was given for opening the Standard bank account, it was opened in Polokoane while CCMA head office is in Johannesburg and a standard bank branch is across the street.

Employees in the finance, procurement and IT department have got a lot of information that can assist in conducting a forensic audit. These employees are all fully aware of the fraudulent activities of CCMA management but due to fear of loosing their jobs are keeping quiet.

The director in the attached annexure B said that she will not be able to pay bonuses for the 2008 financial year as she will face jail time if she does this while the SARS matter is still active. To everyone’s surprise the annual financial report states that an amount of R441000.00 was paid out to executive managers as a “performance bonus”. How did the director managed to do this after informing all CCMA staff members that no one will receive bonuses.

The Director went further and wrote another letter to all staff addressing the 2008/09 audit to staff. In her e mail she threatened staff and mentioned that certain staff wrote a letter to auditors. She lied and said the over expenditure on ACCPAC was due to unanticipated organizational growth and that approval was sought for this. The annual report on page 68 line item. 33 paints a different picture. ALL THIS INFORMATION IS IN ANNEXURE C

The travel expenses of the CCMA have rocketed because of expensive life styles of certain staff members. We have managers appointed to Head office but they do not relocate to Gauteng and they fly every Monday and Thursday to and from Durban or mainly Cape Town. They get to stay in hotels; they get hired cars every 4 days of every month. The policy of the CCMA states that if you are appointed to another region you will only be accommodated by the CCMA for one calendar month. Nazeema Teladia, Shawn Christiansen are Commissioners from Cape Town they are flown and accommodated in all CCMA provinces which to the increased travel expenses. Ronald Bernikow, Afzal Sooberdar, Vanessa Pather are senior managers from Cape Town and Durban but they never relocated CCMA paid for their flights, accommodation and car hire just to enable them to be in office. Some even fly just for a 2 hour meeting and fly back.

The CCMA bought plasma screens for all its offices, these plasmas were hanging on walls for over 12 months not working. Why were they bought if they were going to be non functional for over 12 months. An audit needs to determine how many were bought and how many are actually at CCMA premises.

The CCMA pool car was used to transport the finance manager’s wife between home and the school that she works in. This is a vehicle that belongs to the state how come it was put to private use.

The country is up in arms due to lack of service delivery . Residents complain about corruption and tender irregularities. I never thought this could happen to an institution of CCMA’s magnitude but it is happening. In page 25 of the financial report it is reported that a new performance management system has been implemented in the previous year, this is a blatant lie and the Management of the CCMA will be going to parliament to answer questions about contents of the report. I will not allow them to go and lie in parliament.

My humble plea is that you rescue the CCMA and defend gains made by all fallen comrades and compatriots who laid their lives to ensure that organizations like CCMA are created.

A forensic audit is the only way to resolve CCMA problems. The institution needs transformation the employment equity report on page 26 of the annual financial report says it all. Members of the finance sub committee, HR sub committee , Audit sub committee and tender committee must all be interviewed and asked to copies of their meeting packs, by so doing it will be easy to prove that CCMA management fabricated documents and gave them to auditors as proof that certain contracts were approved

MY ANC!!!!! MY FUTURE!!!!!!MY VISION!!!!!!!

Anonymous