Johannesburg - The commercial crimes unit is conducting an investigation into a possible case of fraud by a skills academy based in Nelspruit, Business Report learnt yesterday.
As part of the probe, the police raided the offices of the Construction Education and Training Authority (Ceta) in Midrand, where they seized several documents.
Christo van Zyl, one of the investigating officers present during the raid, said: "I am under strict orders not to divulge any information about this issue."
Themba Dlamini, Ceta's chief executive, said the probe "was triggered by a sworn statement from an employee alleging the academy has been claiming fraudulently for training and assessing learners or people who needed to be accredited for their skills".
If the claim was true, it meant that Ceta had to "stay on full alert for possible fraudulent claims by service providers. Most importantly, this issue calls on us to tighten up our accreditation process lest we are caught off guard."
Dlamini would not say how many people the academy had trained and how much it had claimed from Ceta. In terms of the arrangement, the academy was expected to provide training in bricklaying, carpentry, plastering, painting and tiling.
The academy was awarded the tender on September 17 2001.
In awarding the tender, Ceta invited "providers to apply for the opportunity to train, qualify and register 45 persons for adviser practitioners, assessor practitioners and verifier or modifier practitioners in the Mpumalanga region in line with the South African Qualifications Authority registered qualification and unit standards."
In the agreement between Ceta and the academy, the Ceta Recognition of Prior Learning agreed to provide support services to the institution in the area of management development. The European Union contributed more than R50 million towards the project.
Snuki Zikalala, the department of labour's communications chief, said: "We welcome any investigation into the alleged fraudulent activities. The minister has always said he will leave no stone unturned in dealing with unscrupulous service providers."
The academy could not be reached for comment at the time of publishing.