Parliament’s joint committee on ethics and members’ interests has more than 2 000 pages of evidence against communications minister Dina Pule, The Star Africa Edition reported on Wednesday.
Pule and her alleged boyfriend, Phosane Mngqibisa, are accused of appointing people to key government positions, along with benefiting financially from sponsorship money intended for the 2012 ICT Indaba.
Committee joint chairman Ben Turok says that the committee’s registrar has started work on the investigation and that Pule has been summoned along with other witnesses. Turok says meetings will take place behind closed doors.
The committee has the power to freeze assets, as it did in the case of ANC parliamentarian Yolanda Botha who it found had benefited from suspect tenders, or can ask the public protector to institute a probe, something Pule is already facing.
Appointed last month, the committee panel will hold hearings between 22 and 26 April.
The multi-party panel comprises Turok, Andrew Mlangeni, Bhekizizwe Radebe, Modjadji Mangena, Diane Kohler Barnard, Jacobus van der Merwe, Thabo Makunyane, Zukiswa Rantho and Swaphi Plaatjie.
Democratic Alliance MP and shadow communications minister Marian Shinn has asked the South African Police Service to investigate Pule and Mngqibisa, along with SABC chief financial officer Gugu Duda and group CEO Lulama Mokhobo.
Nomakhaya Malebane, a former confidante and business partner of Duda’s, told the Sunday Times that Duda — who is said to be friends with Mngqibisa — was given the position of chief financial officer at the SABC as a result of this friendship.
Malebane said Pule orchestrated it so that Duda be selected by the board — receiving her CV directly and getting it into the hands of the board even though it was late into the selection process. — (c) 2013 NewsCentral Media