Tourism committee seeks legal advice on SA Tourism board dissolution

The Tourism Portfolio Committee has announced its intentions to seek legal advice regarding the so-called meeting used by Tourism Minister Patricia de Lille as the basis to disband the South African Tourism board.

Committee Chairperson Ronalda Nalumango observed that the meeting that triggered the board’s disbandment on August 1 was contested between De Lille and the board.

“This is a meeting that forms the basis of dissolving the board. The committee needs to get a legal opinion from the legal services of Parliament on the interpretation of the law,” she said.

Nalumango made the statement when the committee concluded its meeting on Tuesday evening after it received presentations from De Lille, members of the disbanded board, former board chairperson Makhosazana Khanyile, and deputy Lizelle Haskins.

De Lille said the board exceeded its powers by convening a meeting improperly, where they designated one of the board members, Lawson Naidoo, as the board representative.

However, the board insists that there was no meeting on that day other than a round robin resolution, where they designated Naidoo as a board representative and suspended CEO Nombulelo Guliwe.

At the Tuesday meeting where the committee inquired about reasons for the board dissolution and suspension of Guliwe, among other things, Nalumango noted that De Lille ignored substantial issues on governance and financial mismanagement when dissolving the board.

She said the interim new board must deal with the suspension of the CEO for authorising the R4.2 million contract when she was the CFO.

Nalumango also said the South African Tourism matters needed special attention from the portfolio committee.

“Based on the legal advice, the committee may further deliberate on the matter of the dissolution of the board,” she said, adding that there could be a challenge if the dissolved board went ahead with legal action against De Lille.

“If the legal action is taken by the dissolved board, the matter will be sub judice, and the committee may be hampered from dealing with this matter further. Based on the legal advice, again, the committee, through the office of the Speaker, needs to write a letter to the Leader of Government Business expressing concerns about how the minister is dealing with the issues at the South African Tourism.”

Nalumango said while the majority of the members have proposed that the dissolved board be reinstated, they have consulted legal advice.

“We will come back to attend to the matter, but the matter will not just be swept under the carpet. We will again interact with the matter,” she said.

De Lille was asked to respond to the outstanding questions from MPs at the meeting. She was also requested to provide all documents previously requested by the committee, as she was awaiting input from the State Attorney.

During her presentation, she read a statement and made references to an annexure.

ANC MP Sthembile Hlongo said the minister should leave the documents she kept referring to during her presentation and not come with new ones.

“She referred to them, meaning the information is there on those documents,” Hlongo said.

Nalumango said: “All documentation that was not submitted to the chairperson’s office (must) be submitted so that we provide the information to all honourable members.”

In response, De Lille said her parliamentary relations officer will get the documents to all the members.

mayibongwe.maqhina@inl.co.za