9th June 2008

The IFP is outraged at the news of Dr Jabulani Mjwara, the infamous former Head of KwaZulu Natal Department of Agriculture, emerging as the preferred bidder for a multi-million rand tender at Msunduzi Municipality.

"The ANC, whose nominee and protégé Mjwara is, has not only institutionalised corruption in the province through his disastrous tenure at Agriculture but has now effectively spread the web of corruption to another tier of government," said Leader of the Official Opposition in KwaZulu Natal Dr Lionel Mtshali.

The IFP had long criticised the general state of lawlessness, maladministration, fraud and corruption in the department prior to Dr Mjwara's forced departure from Agriculture last year. The former HOD's mismanagement has cost the taxpayer approximately R125-million.

"Dr Mjwara had been sheltered for three years by the provincial government and it had taken the IFP the equal number of years of concentrated effort in Parliament to trigger an investigation into his misconduct," said Dr Mtshali.

The IFP is alarmed at the expanding network of corrupt relationships across the different tiers of government in the province, in this case provincial and local.

"The award of this particular tender to Dr Mjwara sums up all that is wrong with the tendering processes in general: the beneficiary is a close political ally, under a cloud, and hardly competent for the task in question," said Dr Mtshali.

The IFP will pursue the issue of the award of the R12.8-million tender to dredge the Campus Drift in Pietermaritzburg to Dr Mjwara in both the KwaZulu Natal Provincial Parliament and in the Msunduzi Council.