The Special Investigating Unit (SIU) on Wednesday welcomed the outcome of the Gauteng government’s disciplinary inquiry against nine officials from the provincial health department and infrastructure development department.
The officials faced charges relating to alleged irregularities in awarding contracts for refurbishing the AngloGold Ashanti Hospital in 2022.
“Following the SIU’s consequence management recommendations, the office of the premier took disciplinary action against the implicated officials,” SIU spokesperson Kaizer Kganyago said.
The SIU’s investigation uncovered evidence of financial misconduct involving several individuals from the departments.
The Gauteng government acted on the SIU’s recommendations and charged the officials with various offences, including misconduct, fraud and corruption.
As a result, five officials were dismissed, two received written warnings, one has been acquitted and the other could not be subjected to disciplinary action because the department no longer employed him.
“The disciplinary actions show that state institutions are acting on the results of the SIU investigation and implementing the consequences to hold officials implicated to account, recover assets and financial losses incurred by these institutions, and prevent further losses,” Kganyago said.
The AngloGold Ashanti Hospital refurbishment project began in March 2020 under the infrastructure department on behalf of the health department.
“However, during this process, no supply chain management policies or procedures were followed when procuring service providers and contractors for the refurbishment.”
Kganyago said the health department was misled into believing that only minor renovations were needed at the hospital. He said this was a contravention of the Public Finance Management Act and National Treasury’s regulations, and this caused the health department to incur fruitless and wasteful expenditure for goods and services supplied.
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