The Democratic Alliance (DA) MPL, Freddy Sonakile, says the Chairperson for Community Safety and Transport, Kim Medupe, on Tuesday 10 September 2019 prevented members of the legislature to discuss the woes troubling the NTI during a committee meeting on yesterday. He says the chairperson made, what he calls, poor excuses that the newly appointed NTI Board is not in a position to respond to questions and concerns members may have on the state of affairs at the entity. Meanwhile, the speaker at the Provincial Legislature, Susan Dantjie, tells OFM News that she convened a meeting with the Chief Whip and Deputy Speaker to deal with the allegations after she was informed about the allegations.

OFM News previously reported that a forensic report conducted in 2013, dealing with, amongst others, the alleged irregular purchase of 95 second-hand buses for R140 million, and the sale of an aircraft valued at R9 million, along with its hanger valued at R1.7 million - that were sold at a loss of R4.2 million - is yet to be made public.

The NTI allegedly needs R264 million to settle accumulated current liabilities, a further R20 million per month to sustain current services while more than 300 buses of the NTI’s fleet are currently broken down. “Chairperson Medupe has, since her appointment as Chairperson of the Committee, been overly protective of the NTI delegation, specifically pertaining to matters of accountability. Members of the Legislature, who are duly elected to office, cannot be prevented from discharging their Constitutional duties by Committee Chairpersons,” he adds.

Sonakile further adds that the Legislature has a Constitutional duty to conduct effective oversight over departments and entities which are all rife with corruption and maladministration. He further continues that the new NTI Board cannot be prevented from accounting to the Committee about the state of the entity and, in fact, these members should be thoroughly scrutinised, as more than half of the members have served on the boards of either the NTI or other entities previously and can hardly boast of clean records from previous board appointments.

OFM News