INLSA
Then MEC for health Peggy Nkonyeni wanted to conclude a contract quickly with Cape Town-based Uruguayan businessman Gaston Savois company, Intaka, so the ANC could score a donation from it.
This was the testimony of suspended Department of Health legal services general manager Kantha Padayachee.
Durban – Then MEC for health Peggy Nkonyeni wanted to conclude a contract “quickly” with Cape Town-based Uruguayan businessman Gaston Savoi’s company, Intaka, so the ANC could score a donation from it.
This was the testimony on Tuesday of suspended Department of Health legal services general manager Kantha Padayachee in her case before the Labour Court.
Padayachee has gone to court to fight her three-year suspension which she says occurred after she told the police and auditing firm PricewaterhouseCoopers (PWC) about Intaka’s irregular contracts with the department.
The department says Padayachee was suspended after misconduct charges were brought against her. It denies this was due to her being a whistle-blower
Padayachee said Nkonyeni, now Speaker in the KwaZulu-Natal legislature, had told her about the donation when she raised concerns about the contract for oxygen-generating plants.
“She told me she had just become the treasurer of the ANC in the province and was under pressure to conclude the contract (with Intaka) so the ANC could receive the donation,” Padayachee said.
“I advised her that while there was no law preventing donations to political parties, we had a duty to ensure that contracts we entered into benefited the department.”
Savoi and several senior KZN government employees have been charged with racketeering, fraud and money laundering.
The State alleges Savoi made a R1m donation to the ANC to secure the contract to supply water purification and oxygen-generating plants to the provincial Departments of Local Government and Health.
Nkonyeni was initially charged, but charges were withdrawn last October.
Padayachee said that despite her reservations about the contract, among them that Intaka did not want to supply back-up oxygen for the plants, it was awarded.
She said she had questioned why the water purification contract had not gone out to tender, but then-director-general of health Busisiwe Nyembezi had reprimanded her.
“She told me that civil servants were often bureaucratic and the procurement was an emergency.”
Padayachee said when she met Hawks detective Piet du Plooy, who was investigating the Intaka case, she gave him documents relating to the oxygen contract. She said Du Plooy had been “disappointed” about her impending suspension.
“He said he wanted to take the files related to the oxygen tender lest they disappear. He was disappointed that I was due to be suspended because he said I was his star witness.”
The case continues on Wednesday.
The Mercury
