Pretoria - ActionSA in Mpumalanga will today be submitting a letter to the Hawks requesting it to investigate a R4.5 million scandal that has rocked the province’s beauty contest world.
The party has also vowed to write to the auditor-general (AG) regarding the same pageant.
This is according to the party’s provincial chairperson Thokozani Mashiane, who accused the Mpumalanga Economic Regulator of corruption.
The accusations involve the awarding of R4.5 million to a company called Mzimari Productions to hold the province’s beauty contest every year.
Speaking to the Pretoria News yesterday, ActionSA’s spokesperson Simangaliso Shongwe confirmed that their lawyers were drafting the letter to both the Hawks and the AG to be submitted today.
Efforts to reach Mzimari Productions were fruitless.
An identified woman answered the company’s landline number, believed to be an office number, but hung up as soon she was made aware there was a journalist at the other end of the line.
A statement released by ActionSA this week said the contest had been embroiled in allegations of corruption to the tune of R4.5 million every year for the past 12 years which would amount to a total in excess of R50 million.
The statement read: “The entity has been consistently awarding a contract to one company only – Mzimari Productions – allegedly without going out on a fair and transparent tender process.”
It further accused ANC politicians in the province of protecting the company and questioned why the regulator was involved in funding the contest.
“ActionSA’s lawyers will, this week, be in contact with the Hawks and the auditor-general to investigate the dodgy tender of Miss Mpumalanga that has been awarded to Mzimari Productions without any bidding process.
“This is in contravention of legislative prescripts governing public funds,” said Mashiane.
She protested that the entity’s main objective was to regulate the gambling and liquor industries in the province in terms of the relevant legislation and not to host beauty contests for “the enrichment of a single company for 12 years”.
She added that it had not followed relevant legislation in terms of Treasury Regulations, the Public Finance Management Act or the Supply Chain Management Act.
“ActionSA wants the relevant law-enforcement agencies and the AG to investigate whether there is a comprehensive and relevant project feasibility study that has established a clear business case for the award of the beauty contest tender.”
She called for the arrest of all top officials who were involved.
“Managers, CEOs and board members who are complicit in the award of this allegedly corrupt tender need to face the consequences and should be jailed if the investigations confirm their alleged incompetence and complicity as far as the waste of taxpayers’ money is concerned,” Mashiane said.
Pretoria News