Parliament committee steps up corruption fight

MPs on parliament’s watchdog committee Scopa have grown tired of officials using the public purse as pocket money and are cracking down hard on corruption and waste.

The auditor-general’s office estimates that corruption cost the government R46-billion in the last year, up from a previous estimate of around R30-billion.

Addressing the media yesterday, committee chairman Themba Godi said this included having the Hawks and the anti-corruption task team attend meetings so they investigate immediately.

“We are no longer waiting for heads of department to go to the police with wrongdoing, we have made them part and parcel of our meetings,” he said.

The committee had resolved that it was no longer business as usual.

“We resolved that the fight for good governance and accountability should be moved to parliament where it rightfully belongs. Parliament has to ensure that the work of its committees is not just a mere annual ritual but does have an impact on how the executive account,” Godi said.

Since October, the Scopa hearings had specifically focused on fruitless and wasteful and irregular expenditure.

They had identified cases for the Hawks to probe in the Department of International Relations and Cooperation, one in the Department of Basic Education and potential cases in South African Social Security Agency as well as several in Prasa.

Godi said the Treasury would also be called in to give a briefing on its investigations into state-owned entities Denel, Eskom, Transnet, Prasa, and the SABC.

ANC MP Nthabiseng Khunou said: “We want to show that we mean business. The fiscus is not officials’ pocket money. Our people are suffering.

“MPs got frustrated. We wanted to see consequences,” she said.