Conflict of interest ‘red flags’
MORE damning allegations in the City of Joburg’s jobs for pals scandal have emerged with a potentially damaging conflict of interest row set to rock the finance department.
Independent Media has established that the finance member of the mayoral committee (MMC) Dr Rabelani Dagada and the department’s group head of treasury, Seth Mukwevho, are both active directors in a company called AIFHELI Energy.
The company is currently undergoing deregistration, according to a company search.
This seemingly underpins allegations made last week that Dagada was “enriching” his supposed long-standing professional associate and “friend” Mukwevho through the alleged “irregular” awarding of both a lucrative tender and senior jobs.
It was reported two weeks ago that a company in which Mukwevho held a directorship until recently – Radongo Consulting – had received R193 000.01 for two-months’ work (April to June) to compile a “macroeconomic analysis” for the City’s economic growth and employment strategy.
After the tender contract ended, Mukwevho was appointed as a director in the finance department, where he was then promoted to his current position less than three months since joining the City – purportedly without following due processes.
Dagada acknowledged this week that he and Mukwevho were directors in the aforementioned company, but did not say whether he or Mukwevho had declared this alleged conflict of interest to the City.
“This company (AIFHELI Energy) was already undergoing deregistration by 2010 and I had assumed that by the time I became a PR (proportional representation) councillor in 2014, it was already fully deregistered,” the MMC said.
Dagada also admitted that he and Mukwevho had registered another company together in 2000 – AIFHELI Holdings – but that that company had never traded.
Mukwevho, according to sources in the finance department, received the macroeconomic analysis tender due to undue influence allegedly exerted by Dagada.
Dagada denied this, saying he had tried to dissuade Mukwevho from tendering in a bid for the contract.
A source close to the proceedings said economic development was the “competent department to champion such a strategy (of economic analysis)”.
Red flags regarding Mukwevho’s supposed “irregular appointment” to his current senior post as group head of treasury were also raised following what sources said was his meteoric rise from being a city supplier to being a senior public official.
Independent Media understands that Mukwevho did not serve a probation period after being employed, first, as a director in finance shortly after his contract ended in June, before being promoted to his current position.
Ishwar Ramdas, the city’s group chief financial officer, neither confirmed nor denied whether Mukwevho had served probation prior to being promoted, saying only that “I am satisfied that the prescribed process was followed in the appointment of Mr Mukwevho”.