SIU drawn in to probe illegal taxis

Converted vehicles brought ruin and death

Public protector Busisiwe Mkhwebane has teamed up with the Special Investigating Unit (SIU) to speed up an investigation into illegal panel-van conversions, which saw thousands of goods vehicles being passed off as Quantum minibus taxis.

Mkhwebane’s office has confirmed the investigation, started by her predecessor, will get forensic assistance from the SIU.

Major financial institutions, including Toyota Financial Services and SA Taxi Finance, as well as banks financed illegally converted minibuses which were later taken off the road for safety reasons, leaving taxi owners heavily indebted.

Last year transport officials testified that 2 353 illegally converted minibuses had been identified by a task team formed to investigate the matter.

During public hearings complainant and whistleblower Hennie de Beer, a former taxi finance manager at Absa, said cutting panels to fit windows weakened the structure of the vehicle, with zero chances of survival in an accident.

Seats bolted to a weak floorboard instead of the chassis, and seat-belts attached to the seat instead of the body of the vehicle resulted in passengers being flung out with their seats in a crash.

De Beer said he documented at least 200 accidents in which passengers were flung from the illegally converted minibuses.

Public protector spokesperson Cleopatra Mosana confirmed the SIU has been brought in to conduct forensic investigations as their office had no such capacity.

A source close to the public protector’s investigation said the SIU had been enlisted because the public protector’s powers limited her investigations to state affairs and issues of public administration, meaning she could only consider the role of government in the affair.

Former Pretoria taxi boss, Lucas Mogotlane, who testified during public hearings into the illegal conversions last year, said he was anxious for the investigation to conclude. Mogotlane had a fleet of nine taxis accumulated in two years in the 1980s.

When government implemented the taxi recapitalisation programme in 1996, he faced ruin. Awarded R50 000 for each taxi, he received R450 000 for his scrapped fleet and immediately set out acquiring minibuses with safety specifications in line with the programme.

By 2009, he had accumulated seven of what he thought were Toyota Quantum Ses’fikile minibuses, financed by various banks, including Nedbank and Wesbank.

Mogotlane was repaying R56 000 a month to various financial institutions.

But when a vehicle he guaranteed crashed, five people died after they flew out of the vehicle with their seats.

“The deaths of those people are on my conscience, they are an eternal burden on my shoulders. My driver, who I knew like my brother, died in that crash. He had a wife and children. The other four people who died also had loved ones and responsibilities. It is unbearable,” he said.

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