Independent Newspapers
Durban’s former city manager Michael Sutcliffe. Photo: Nqobile Mbonambi
Durban – One of the Manase report’s fiercest detractors, former eThekwini municipal manager Michael Sutcliffe, welcomed the release of the full version of the report on Tuesday but maintained that it was a poorly investigated audit.
“I have argued that the report has been badly handled. I have said it’s important to release the report, scrutinise it and see that it has been poorly researched and there are huge gaps in it,” he said.
Sutcliffe made it clear that he would not back down on his R10 million lawsuit against the incumbent city manager, S’bu Sithole.
Last year, Sithole said that the city had resolved to pursue criminal charges against Sutcliffe and take legal action to recover R1.1m which, he alleged, had been lost through Sutcliffe’s failure to report fraud.
The report referred to a previous audit by Ngubane and Co, which found that the housing unit had failed to comply with supply chain processes of the Municipal Finance Management Act.
This involved the outsourcing of work to consultants who prepared and invited tender quotations, evaluated quotations and recommended successful bidders, in contravention of supply chain management regulations. This led to the alleged manipulation of a tender process valued at R1.1m related to a Mariannridge housing upgrade project.
The Manase report said Sutcliffe did not report irregular acts regarding the Mariannridge probe to police.
“Dr Sutcliffe advised us that he had received legal advice that he should not report the matter to the police until the municipality’s own disciplinary proceedings against the implicated officials had been completed and, further, that the case as set out by the Ngubane report was weak,” it said.
Sutcliffe only reported the matter to the Hawks in June 2011 after the Manase investigators told him there was prima facie evidence that serious offences had taken place.
In Sutcliffe’s letter to the Hawks, he said the Ngubane report “seemed to suggest that some irregular acts may have occurred, alternatively committed by various individuals identified in the report”. But he also told the Hawks that his senior officials named in the report denied any wrongdoing.
On Tuesday Sutcliffe said there had been no financial loss to the city.
“I received legal advice that you can’t report something that doesn’t exist. No one showed me a loss,” he said.
The Mercury
