Gangster State

(Nora) #1

bids, 252 either had bid compliance issues, such as not possessing a
valid tax clearance certificate, or had failed to ‘meet the minimum
functionality threshold’.^11 In other words, they were simply not capable
of delivering on large projects. Despite these shortcomings, the
department loaded all 361 companies onto its database, along with a
few that had not even tendered. Many of them would go on to clinch
lucrative contracts to build RDP houses.
Explaining how fraught the process was, one former department
official claimed Magashule was the central figure in the saga. ‘We were
asked to load batches of new companies onto the database, but many
of them didn’t even have proper NHBRC [National Home Builders
Registration Council] papers or the correct CIDB [Construction
Industry Development Board] grading, and many of these companies’
finances weren’t in order,’ this source said. ‘The technical committee
raised these com​pliance issues with the department’s bosses, but they
were ignored.’ The source alleged that the head of department, Mpho
Mokoena, made it clear where his orders were coming from: ‘Mokoena
told us that Ace had instructed him to work with these people [the new
contractors who were found to be non-compliant], that we needed to
help them become compliant.’
There were also more overt signs of Magashule’s early meddling in
the department’s affairs. In 2009 , he launched his now infamous
Operation Hlasela (Operation Attack), supposedly aimed at eradicating
poverty and improving service delivery in all spheres of government.
But critics say Operation Hlasela was abused for party-political
purposes.^12 Indeed, the public protector would later confirm that it
‘conflated’ the functions of the provincial government with the interests
of the ANC.^13

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