The Gauteng Department of Local Government and Housing rejects the falsehoods peddled by the Democratic Alliance (DA). The awarding of a R32 million tender to Devgroup for the construction of 800 reconstruction and development programme (RDP) houses was made as an open tender which was not signed under the table.
DA's MP Butch Steyn is playing to the gallery and creating media hype with issues he could have had clarity on had he chosen to put questions to the department or MEC Kgaogelo Lekgoro. He instead chose to confuse the public with half baked information which had not been tested nor verified.
So it should be made clear that when Devgroup was awarded the contract, Sipho Mashinini was neither working for the department nor the National Home Builders Registration Council (NHBRC). He was actually working in the private sector.
Devgroup was awarded the contract on 27 January 2009, and Mashinini was appointed acting CEO of the NHBRC in September 2009. The claim of conflict of interest as been made by Steyn neither here nor there as the department followed all the proper procedures before appointing Devgroup to contribute in the construction of houses in the province.
As required by law, the department is obliged to enroll all its housing delivery programmes with NHBRC, and that requirement cannot be overlooked. Also the process of inspecting houses is done in three phases. Firstly, inspection is carried out by a team of inspectors from the department and then by the municipal inspectors and NHBRC inspectors. All of them are responsible for ensuring that contractors adhere to agreed norms and standards according to the Builders Manual.
Therefore, the department does not pay any amount to a developer or contractor unless all necessary standards have been met per milestone. There is no way that NHBRC will approve a house without our inspectors and those from municipality having done their own inspections. The municipality is the one that issues occupancy certificate once the house has been completed and inspected by all three inspectors and not NHBRC.
The DA is at Liberty to call for any investigation of apparent corruption. However to probe the R32 million tender is premature and is a ploy aimed at creating some media hype over the appointment of Mashinini as the CEO of the NHBRC as there's no direct conflict of interest since Devgroup as a company was appointed to build houses and not an individual.
For more information contact:
Themba Sepotokele
Cell: 082 490 9869
Fred Mokoko
Cell: 082 447 8407
Issued by: Department of Local Government and Housing, Gauteng Provincial Government
22 April 2010
