Justice and Correctional Services Minister, Ronald Lamola, says on the Parliament Monitoring Group’s website, that presently the SIU has approached the Special Tribunal to recover the over R30 million lost to the ground and air ambulance contract from former North West Health Department head, Thabo Lekalakala. 

The former provincial health department head is opposing the attempt by the SIU to have the more than R30 million in question deducted from his personal assets/finances.

The SIU has already seized over R2,1 million of Lekalakala’s pension fund, and at present, he is unable to access it despite no longer being an employee of the health department. Last week, the North West High Court exonerated Lekalakala and former finance MEC, Wendy Nelson, of fraud charges related to the appointment of the former by the latter. The state contended that Lekalakala misrepresented himself in his application for the senior role of superintendent-general in the Provincial Health Department and Nelson was aware of this alleged fraud.

Nelson was on the selection panel at the time. Meanwhile, Lekalakala is still facing charges relating to the irregular appointment of Gupta-linked Mediosa, for a mobile clinic.

In 2019, the North West provincial government, then led by Premier Job Mokgoro, announced that the province had terminated some of its controversial contracts including that of Mediosa; the office of the Premier’s contract with IT Company, Nepo Data Dynamics which came into the spotlight during the Hawks’ raid of the Premier’s office in March 2018; North West Development Corporation’s contract with Tokiso Security;  and the Department of Rural Environment and Agricultural Development’s (READ’s) contract with Agri-Delight. The Buthelezi contract was yet to be terminated at the time.

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