This follows after he sacked the HOD, Thabo Lekalakala, after he was found guilty of five charges, including submitting a fake CV and doing a multi-million rand upfront payment to a Gupta-linked company.

The spokesperson of the Health Department, Tebogo Lekgethwane, says in terms of Section 100(1)(b), the administrator, Jeanette Hunter, is the Accounting Officer. There is no need to appoint an acting HOD as the Administrator has been playing that role already. He said, however, that he needs “to point out that because Dr Lekalakala's contract was already coming to an end, the department has already advertised the post of HOD. Ideally, the administrator will stay until we appoint a new HOD.”

The department was placed under administration in May 2019, two weeks before the cabinet decided to put the whole provincial government under administration. Mokgoro made the final verdict of dismissing Lekalakala with effect 13 January 2020, after a disciplinary hearing that has been ongoing since 2018. Lekalakala has been suspended many times by the department. In 2018, he was arrested with the former Health MEC of the province, Wendy Nelson. Lekalakala was arrested for fraud and Nelson for an irregular appointment of a senior official in the department in 2014. They were released on R20 000 bail each on the same day that they were arrested.

OFM News/Marvin Ntsane