Nhleko report on Nkandla gets a roasting
OPPOSITION parties on the Nkandla ad hoc committee yesterday argued that the report by Police Minister Nathi Nhleko they would be studying was not legally binding and once again demanded that the public protector be called to testify.
The committee met yesterday to adopt a draft programme of their work which will get under way on July 21 with a presentation of the report by Nhleko. The committee will then inspect Nkandla.
However, the DA’s James Selfe tabled a submission outlining why the party believed the report should not be considered. The submission says the report is irrational, unconstitutional and unlawful, and seeks to replace it with a report by the public protector. It also argues that it is fraught with political motivations.
It calls the report amateurish, facile and superficial, saying it is poorly drafted, riddled with grammatical, spelling and typographical errors, and is, in places, factually inaccurate.
It points to the use of Wikipedia as a source and questions the “experts” used in the making of the report.
The ACDP’s Steve Swart and the FF Plus’s Corne Mulder agreed with the DA on the issue of the report’s legitimacy.
Mulder also insisted that other people be called to the committee to testify. As one of two representatives of the smaller parties on the committee, he said COPE’s Mosiuoa Lekota had also requested that he convey this message to the committee.
But the ANC’s Mmamoloko Khubayi said this was “reinventing the wheel”.
“An ad hoc committee was set up. It did work and it was adopted by parliament. Colleagues might not be happy with it because they walked out, but work has been done,” she said.
The UDM’s Nqabayomzi Kwankwa, however, disagreed, saying opposition parties had wanted to call witnesses in the second ad hoc committee, and even after their walkout nobody had been called.
Meanwhile, Nhleko has revealed in response to a parliamentary question by the DA that the report cost R26 000 to produce – with payments made to the cultural and architectural experts used.