Officials of the troubled Dr Ruth Segomotsi Mompati District Municipality in North West are under the microscope following the R38 million used to build a shack call centre.

The call centre in Vryburg was the centre of attention last week. The district municipality allegedly constructed a duplicate call centre with public funds which were meant for service delivery. DA Caucus leader in Dr Ruth Segomotsi Mompati District municipality, Coenrad Herbst, said the party wrote to the Special Investigation Unit (SIU) to investigate the matter.

The Vryburg R38 million shack call centre. Photo supplied

On Tuesday, the North West Provincial Legislature Portfolio Committee on the Premier, Finance, Cooperative Governance, Human Settlements and Traditional Affairs, chaired by Aaron Motswana, summoned municipal officials to clarify the call centre.

During the presentation, the municipal manager, Itumeleng Jonas, disclosed the municipality was paying R258,974 for eight Lenovo desktops, R524,435 for car radios in the emergency vehicles, R324,566 for handheld walkie-talkies, R3,758 for eight sets of a computer mouse, R6,800 for eight keyboards, R36,952 for eight “Logic Pro” headphones, R16,253 for one Huawei Router and R24,910 for fibre and internet used at the call centre.  

Jonas said some of the documents taken by the office of the Auditor-General for investigations on the call centre tender would only be retrieved at a later stage, thus they could not be provided as evidence before the committee.

Chairperson of North West Provincial Legislature Portfolio Committee on Premier, Finance, Cooperative Governance, Human Settlements and Traditional Affairs, Aaron Motswana. Photo: Screengrab

“It can't be true that we have to wait for that information from the Auditor-General, by the way, whilst you are going to retrieve it, the committee had already agreed with the auditor-general this past Friday that we must write a letter to them. They will gladly give us the information. Such letter has been signed off by me yesterday (13/11), en route to the Auditor-General, so we are waiting for that information,” Motswana said.

He also said the figures of items used at the call centre did not make sense and the fact that supporting documents were not handed over to the committee did not help matters. Mayor Motseokae Maje said after being aware of allegations levelled against the municipality through media platforms, he directed the municipal manager to initiate an investigation as the matter involved several administrations. 

“We shall cooperate with law enforcement agencies. We are at no stage prepared to defend or protect anybody. We shall avail whatever that is in front of us.”

OFM News/Kekeletso Mosebetsi          Daphné/Corné