Minister’s husband allegedly implicated in draft forensic audit report
A DRAFT forensic audit report commissioned by the Universal Service Access Agency of South Africa (Usaasa) in 2011 made adverse findings against a number of employees in the organisation.
These included businessman Thato Abrahams, now husband of Digital Technologies Minister Stella Ndabeni-Abrahams, while he was an employee there.
The forensic report – titled “Investigation into alleged Irregularities and Maladministration with regard to various Human Resource, Procurement and Governance issues during the period of April 1, 2009 to September 28, 2011 at
Usaasa” – was conducted by Forensic Investigation Risk & Recovery Management (Pty) Limited and is alleged by a whistle-blower to have been removed from public record.
It is unclear whether this was done deliberately by Ndabeni-Abrahams while she was deputy minister of her current portfolio and was alleged to be in a relationship with one of those accused in the report at the time.
Independent Media is in possession of the report, in which the table of contents shows that Abrahams had been implicated in a human resources irregularity at Usaasa. The pages detailing this in the report and implicating Abrahams at Usaasa appear to have been expunged and are nowhere to be found.
Independent Media’s special investigations unit contacted the auditing firm which conducted the report.
A company spokesperson, Perun Naidoo, said their firm was instructed by Usaasa’s management to commission the investigation. The firm would not go into detail about the findings.
“Obviously, we would require their consent to release any information. In the circumstances, we regret that we cannot accede to your request without a directive from Usaasa.”
However, a source close to the developments at the time alleges Abrahams had committed theft, where about 20 iPads and other electronic gadgets were taken from Usaasa headquarters.
“The forensic report was given to the then deputy minister (Ndabeni-Abrahams) and was concealed from public record while Thato Abrahams was an employee at Usaasa’s marketing and communications department,” said the source.
Another executive from Usaasa’s finance department at the time, who asked not to be named, said that when he received the report from the auditing firm and top management,
the pages had already been removed.
“By the time the report came to my department, the pages implicating Abrahams and other colleagues had already been removed,” he said.
The report states that around September 2011 the board of directors of Usaasa received information relating to allegations of material breaches of Usaasa’s supply chain management processes and procedures, human resource processes, governance processes and non-compliance with the duly approved delegations of authority of the agency. According to the report, a decision was taken by the board to institute a forensic investigation.
“That is when a task team was appointed to determine the terms of reference for the investigation.”
Among its findings was that the suspension and disciplinary processes instituted against those implicated in wrongdoing had rendered Usaasa dysfunctional, where unauthorised and irregular expenditure had exceeded R80 million. Forensic Investigation Risk & Recovery Management (Pty) Limited subsequently implicated 21 employees in wrongdoing at Usaasa, including Abrahams.
However, Abrahams claimed to have no knowledge of the investigation or the report.
“If the report was a draft, then I am unsure why it is reasonable for you to even run a story based on it.”
As for the alleged theft of iPads, he claims he took new iPads home to configure them for connection to the Usaasa intranet and, once done, they were handed to their intended users.
“There was no wrongdoing. If there was, Usaasa would have acted against me … I joined Usaasa in 2010, before I met my wife. To avoid any perceived conflict of interest, when my wife was appointed minister, I resigned from Usaasa. When I resigned, I returned all the electronics (camera, laptop, iPad and modem) to Usaasa,” he said.
Ndabeni-Abrahams’ spokesperson Mish Molakeng said the minister denied that she had received such a report, including in her prior capacity as deputy.
“The minister and the department have repeatedly asked the media to kindly direct any evidence of wrongdoing in the conduct of the office of the minister, the department or any of its officials directly to law enforcement agencies,” he said.
Usaasa spokesperson Keitumetse Hlahatsi denied they were aware of the report, after initially saying in a previous phone conversation that they had managed to track down the report and management was going through it.
“Please note that the current management of Usaasa is not aware of or in possession of the said report and is unable to comment on the questions posed,” she said.