More claims swirl around Morar
Whistleblower says more tender procedures in KZN education department have been bypassed
Awhistleblower has made fresh allegations this week of further capture of the Kwazulu-natal education department by Ithala Development Finance Corporation board chairperson Roshan Morar’s auditing firm, Morar Incorporated.
According to the source, who has intimate knowledge of the department’s inner workings, Morar Inc has been awarded another multimillion-rand contract by the department — this time to audit its school nutrition programme.
Morar Inc has allegedly also seconded a number of staff members to the directorate providing support to the nutrition programme, which has been plagued by allegations of corruption and nepotism since 2016.
“The capture of the department is not limited to the CFO’S [chief financial officer’s] office. Right now, Morar has been tasked with auditing the Kwazulu-natal leg of the national school nutrition programme, with nothing going out to tender,” the source said.
“Guess whose staff have been seconded to the department to assist with internal controls? Morar’s.”
A second source in the department, who asked not to be named, said that Morar had been “chosen” to do the audit by top management, rather than through a public tender process.
The allegations follow disclosures by the Mail & Guardian last week that six of Morar’s staff were appointed to run the departmental CFO’S office by former head of department Cassius Lubisi in 2007.
Lubisi was appointed as chairperson of Morar Inc in April this year, after his retirement from the presidency last year.
Morar — a non-executive director of the Harith General Group, which is a partner in the Takatso Consortium involved in the SAA buyout — was also awarded a multimillion-rand contract to audit the education procurement programme in 2017 without it going out to tender. The request to bypass procurement procedures was signed off on by the current head of department (HOD), Enoch Nzama.
Another of Morar’s companies,
Amakhono Capital, was sanctioned by the Special Investigating Unit (SIU) earlier this year over personal protective equipment fraud, after the deal was exposed by the M&G.
The SIU found that the R4-million contract to provide backpack spray guns to the department was irregular, because key documents were submitted after the deadline expired, and accepted a proposal from Morar that he pay the department back the profit he made on the deal.
“Education is captured. There are people placed everywhere — real estate; audit; procurement — who have come in through one or another of Morar’s companies,” the whistleblower said.
Morar, a former Public Investment Corporation (PIC) board member, is deeply linked to various levels of leadership of the governing party, and was appointed to the boards of a number of public entities during former president Jacob Zuma’s tenure.
However, Morar’s influence extends across ANC factions and he has continued to secure key contracts with municipalities and government departments under Zuma’s successor, Cyril Ramaphosa.
Morar also sits on the board of a nonprofit organisation called the Sakhulwazi Foundation, together with along with Kwazulu-natal premier Sihle Zikalala and education MEC Kwazi Mshengu.
Several key tenders awarded to Morar Incorporated — including a R30-million ethekwini municipality audit that ballooned to R93-million, and a R49-million contract with the Msunduzi municipality — are both under investigation by the provincial treasury.
Morar last week denied any wrongdoing in his relationship with the department — and the appointment of Lubisi — saying that the former education superintendent general had not been in the employ of Morar & Associates, as Morar Incorporated was then known.
This week Morar told the M&G that none of his staff had been seconded to provide support for the school nutrition audit.
Education MEC Kwazi Mshengu referred the M&G to Nzama. “I don’t have this information. The HOD will have to respond to it,”’ Mshengu said.
Mshengu said there had been no secondment of Morar staff to the school nutrition programme.
“There is no staff from Morar’s office seconded to nutrition, at least not since my arrival. I will ask the HOD to respond to you,” Mshengu said.
Nzama did not respond to calls and SMS messages from the M&G.
It is not clear at this stage whether the Amakhono scandal will affect Morar’s tenure at Ithala, which falls under the province’s economic development ministry.
The Ithala board has referred the matter to economic development MEC Ravi Pillay, who has requested a report from both the SIU and Morar.
Pillay’s spokesperson, Bheki Mbanjwa, said a meeting with Morar on 24 June had been postponed to a later date because of an emergency.
Mbanjwa said Pillay had not yet received a formal report on the matter from the SIU.
SIU spokesperson Kaizer Kganyago said a report on the matter was still being finalised.