Riyaz Patel
The Special Investigating Unit (SIU) executed a search and seizure order at the Lepelle Northern Water Board in Polokwane relating to an investigation into alleged tender corruption in a multi-billion rand water project in Limpopo.
“We’ve been asking the Lepelle Northern Water Board to give us documents and the documents were not forthcoming. We then went to court to get a court order to get what we want,” said the SIU”s Kaizer Kganyago Monday.
He said the SIU investigation is probing alleged corruption in the process of appointing subcontractors in the multi-billion rand water scheme that was meant to provide water to the rural areas of Limpopo.
“We need to understand how this process went and if there was anything untoward in the process,” Kganyago said, noting that this follows on a proclamation by President Cyril Ramaphosa last year.
Ramaphosa authorised soldiers to be deployed to the Vaal River System for 12 months following several incidents of vandalism and theft.
Kganyago said they were seizing any and all documents related to their investigation at the Lepelle Northern Water Board.
“All our teams from all our sections are there. They are taking electronic information, they are taking paper documents, and we are going to analyse them and make sure we get to the bottom of this.”
The DA said allegations of corruption had plagued the project since inception, leaving some 50 villages around Giyani with no potable water.
“Currently residents have to walk for up to five kilometres to carry contaminated water back to their houses,” DA member of parliament Jacques Smalle said.
He said he believed the project was just one example of widespread corruption that has incapacitated government departments in Limpopo.
