Dodgy tenders, paying rent for vacant buildings and forking out millions for employees improperly fired are reportedly some of the findings in Public Protector Thuli Madonsela’s as yet unreleased provisional report on parastatal Passenger Rail Agency of SA.<\/p>\n
Some of her provisional findings in the report Missing Tracks<\/em>, dated March 2015, were published in the Sunday Times.<\/p>\n Prasa\u2019s group chief strategy officer Sipho Sithole told News24 on Sunday they had not yet received the report and this was their first sight of such information.<\/p>\n \u201cWe can\u2019t comment on what has been put in the paper until the public protector has officially submitted the report to Prasa and the board has engaged with it,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n He said Madonsela\u2019s office had not contacted them about when the document would be released.<\/p>\n Findings<\/strong><\/p>\n The provisional report, which is said to point a finger at axed Prasa boss Lucky Montana, found a number of incidents amounted to improper conduct, wasteful expenditure or maladministration.<\/p>\n One of the findings was reportedly that a R1.1 billion contract to provide stations with high-speed access gates was awarded improperly to a company after tender procedures were not followed.<\/p>\n Montana\u2019s cellphone went straight to voicemail on Sunday morning.<\/p>\n The public protector recently stated she had delayed her report to consider further inputs her office received.<\/p>\n Prasa chair Popo Molefe told the newspaper that the report\u2019s release was delayed after investigators apparently found Montana had withheld the subpoenas of about 13 employees who had been expected to make submissions to the public protector.<\/p>\n He claimed some of these employees came forward to say they were willing to make submissions after Montana was fired.<\/p>\n \u201cWe have read about this in the paper that that was apparently the cause of the delay and postponement but we don\u2019t know who those employees are,\u201d Sithole responded.<\/p>\n Asked whether the Prasa board was in contact with Montana, he said: \u201cI don\u2019t know whether the board has any ongoing dealings with him\u201d.<\/p>\n Fraud charges<\/strong><\/p>\n Montana has laid fraud charges against a number of Prasa executives.<\/p>\n One of the charges relates to a R209 million tender to fence Prasa\u2019s depots.<\/p>\n He opened a fraud, blackmail, and corruption cases against Molefe and two other Prasa executives.<\/p>\n Montana was fired from Prasa with immediate effect on July 16. He regards his dismissal as illegal.<\/p>\n His removal came amid reports that Prasa had paid R600 million for 13 Afro4000 locomotives imported from Spain, which were apparently too high for local conditions and could damage overhead power cables.<\/p>\n A week ago, Transport Minister Dipuo Peters indicated she had asked the Auditor General (AG) to probe alleged financial mismanagement at Prasa.<\/p>\n “The minister has commissioned the AG’s office to look into alleged violations of the Public Finance Management Act and other related statutes regarding contracts, engagement of service providers and payments to service providers including but not limited to issues that have received wide media coverage recently,” her spokesperson Tiyani Rikhotso said at the time.<\/p>\n Peters said given recent revelations and the outcomes of other processes linked to corporate governance, she believed an independent institution, such as the AG, was better placed to look into Prasa\u2019s financial affairs.<\/p>\n Source: News24<\/a><\/p>\nMore on Prasa<\/h3>\n