{"id":442058,"date":"2020-10-20T12:50:38","date_gmt":"2020-10-20T10:50:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/?p=442058"},"modified":"2021-03-29T14:27:10","modified_gmt":"2021-03-29T12:27:10","slug":"r10-5-billion-under-investigation-for-covidpreneur-looting-in-south-africa","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/government\/442058\/r10-5-billion-under-investigation-for-covidpreneur-looting-in-south-africa\/","title":{"rendered":"R10.5 billion under investigation for &#8216;Covidpreneur&#8217; looting in South Africa"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>A group of South African law enforcement agencies say that they are investigating more than R10.5 billion in potentially corrupt coronavirus spending across South Africa.<\/p>\n<p>This is more than double the amount under investigation two months ago, the Special Investigating Unit (SIU) said in a presentation to parliament on Tuesday (20 October).<\/p>\n<p>The SIU said that most of this reported irregular spending was at the provincial government level, with the majority of complaints including:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Over-pricing of Personal Protective Equipment (PPE);<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li>Possible recoveries relating to under-delivery by service providers;<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li>Service providers were awarded contracts over R1 million whilst not being registered for VAT;<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li>The use of the emergency provisions was found to be incorrect;<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li>PPE price differentiation was beyond market-related prices;<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li>Service providers charged rates for the supply of PPEs in excess of the regulated pricing lists as issued by Treasury;<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li>Certain service providers were found to have only been registered with the Companies and Intellectual Property Commission during February and March 2020;<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li>Certain service providers were already in the de-registration process when they quoted and were awarded contracts;<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li>Non-essential goods were procured under the Covid-19 emergency provisions;<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li>Certain companies were awarded BBBEE points as level 1 contributors when they, in fact, did not qualify.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><a  data-lightbox=\"post-image\" href=\"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/10\/SIU-1.png\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-442060 aligncenter\" src=\"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/10\/SIU-1.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"1205\" height=\"816\" srcset=\"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/10\/SIU-1.png 1205w, https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/10\/SIU-1-300x203.png 300w, https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/10\/SIU-1-1024x693.png 1024w, https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/10\/SIU-1-768x520.png 768w, https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/10\/SIU-1-1200x813.png 1200w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1205px) 100vw, 1205px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p><a  data-lightbox=\"post-image\" href=\"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/10\/SIU-2.png\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-442062 aligncenter\" src=\"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/10\/SIU-2.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"1235\" height=\"822\" srcset=\"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/10\/SIU-2.png 1235w, https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/10\/SIU-2-300x200.png 300w, https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/10\/SIU-2-1024x682.png 1024w, https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/10\/SIU-2-768x511.png 768w, https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/10\/SIU-2-1200x799.png 1200w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1235px) 100vw, 1235px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>The fight against corruption is one of the core focuses of South Africa&#8217;s new economic recovery plan, says president Cyril Ramaphosa.<\/p>\n<p>In a presentation to parliament on Tuesday (20 October), Ramaphosa said that decisive action against crime and corruption is essential to &#8216;inclusive growth&#8217;.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;The decisive action we have taken to prevent, detect and act against Covid-related corruption will strengthen the broader fight against crime,&#8221; Ramaphosa said.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;The Special Investigating Unit has made significant progress in probing allegations of criminal conduct in all public entities during the national state of disaster.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Ramaphosa said that the work of the SIU and its investigations will be made public once all the due processes have been completed.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Law enforcement agencies are being strengthened and provided with adequate resources to enable the identification and swift prosecution of corruption and fraud,&#8221; he said.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;We wish to assure all South African that there will be no political interference with the work of law enforcement agencies.&#8221;<\/p>\n<hr \/>\n<p><strong>Read: <a href=\"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/business\/441874\/south-africas-updated-list-of-high-risk-countries-comes-at-a-cost\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">South Africa\u2019s updated list of high-risk countries comes at a cost<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A group of South African law enforcement agencies say that they are investigating more than R10.5 billion in potentially corrupt coronavirus spending across South Africa.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":390529,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[26],"class_list":["post-442058","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-government","tag-headline"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/442058","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/10"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=442058"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/442058\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":442076,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/442058\/revisions\/442076"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/390529"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=442058"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=442058"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=442058"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}