North West SCOPA instructs NWDC Board to give detailed info on purchase of all Seasons Resort
The North West Provincial Legislature’s Standing Committee on Public Accounts (SCOPA) has instructed the Board Chairperson of the North West Development Corporation(NWDC), Mr Dali Duma, to furnish the Committee with documents pertaining to the purchase of ALL Seasons Resort and Game farm; explanation as to why the purchase price increased from R28m that the board had secured for during the auction to R40m and ended up paying R49m; the list of the animals in the Game farm; and the issue of minerals that are supposedly in the precinct of the game farm.
Mr Duma has been given until Friday, 09 March at 12h00 to furnish the Committee with the report of the sale and until Tuesday 13 March 2018 with the rest of the information.
The Committee was holding Public Finance Management Act public hearings with the Office of the Premier (OOP) and the NWDC. The hearings were looking into the 16/17 financial year Audit Outcomes of both the OOP and NWDC.
In his presentation, Mr Duma said the hotel was bought for Tourism purposes and also to create employment opportunities. He said it is now employing 43 people. When asked about the game farm and the number of animals in the farm he confirmed that the property was bought with the farm.
“I have seen some of the Game but cannot attest to the numbers. I have no full knowledge of how many were they and whether anything had been moved.
“I am not aware of any minerals. I have seen a place that looks like a quarry, and that suggest to me that something could have been mined there but I am not sure,” said Mr Duma.
The Committee is in possession of the transfer documents; the guarantee letter from the Provincial Treasury for the amount of R40m; and the NWDC board resolution authorising the purchase of the hotel. All these were submitted by the board to the Committee and the Auditor General’s office. The questions of the Committee emanates from the documents received and the Auditor General’s report.
For the Office of the Premier, the Committee was mostly interested in the Irregular expenditure of R112 m that was incurred in contravention of the Supply Chain Management. In his response the Committee, Dr. Lydia Sebegoe, the Director General of the Province said a service provider that was procured as an implementing agent, used their own internal systems to procure but “we have since agreed with them to follow our own (the PFMA).
The Premier, Supra Mahumapelo, thanked the Committee for its robustness and that he will always ensure that “All executive arms of state have a good relationship with Chapter 9 institutions including the Auditor General.”
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