Wyndham Hartley: Business Day
TWO political parties have called for Health Minister Aaron Motsoaledi to be called before parliament's health committee in light of a "horror" audit report which identifies irregular expenditure of more than R5bn. The auditor-general's report to the health committee comes against the background of the Department of Health's plan to institute the National Health Insurance (NHI) scheme. This has led to questions about how the department would be able to manage the scheme if it could not successfully manage its present budget. Both the Democratic Alliance (DA) and the Independent Democrats (ID) called for Dr Motsoaledi to be summoned to parliament to account for the audit. DA health spokesman Mike Waters said the auditor-general's briefing to the committee revealed the Health Department had incurred "irregular expenditure" of R5,8bn in 2010-11. This accounted for 25 percent of total national government irregular expenditure for 2010-11. Waters said he would be writing to the chairman of the portfolio committee, Monwabisi Bevan Goqwana, to request that Dr Motsoaledi should appear before the committee to account for his department's poor financial management. He said the department was planning to roll out the NHI scheme over the next 14 years, "at an estimated cost of R255bn in 2025", but the department's "inability to manage its own finances raises questions about its ability to manage the vast budget of the NHI". ID health spokesman Haniff Hoosen described the presentation by the auditor-general as "like watching a horror movie". The investigation involved an audit of the construction of hospitals and clinics in SA. Hoosen said among the "shocking findings" were "irregular and fruitless expenditure worth hundreds of millions of rand. Forty-three percent of the projects implemented were in contravention of procurement legislation. Tenders worth R538m were awarded even though the contractor did not have the capabilities of executing the contracts. As a result of this, a further amount of R313m was wasted on replacement contractors to finish the job". Hoosen said tenders were awarded although contractors were noncompliant in that they did not have valid tax clearance certificates. In one case in Gauteng, a contractor was awarded a tender worth R480m with a fraudulent tax certificate. He said 70 percent of the tenders awarded were completed late (on average 22 months late), but no penalties for late completion were enforced by the department. Hoosen said tenders to the value of R876m were awarded to contractors who were either not registered with the Construction Industry Development Board or had a grading lower than required for the tender, adding that Dr Motsoaledi should be called before the committee. Health Committee chairman Bevan Goqwana said it was untenable that a department with a R6-billion infrastructure budget had accounting officers who allowed these kinds of practices to unfold without acting against them. He demanded greater control of affairs by heads of department, saying they needed to be hands-on and provide regular progress reports on all projects undertaken. The committee was also concerned about the time taken to complete some projects. Goqwana said the committee wanted these matters to be handled with the utmost urgency.
