Nelson Mandela Bay in the dark due to dodgy street light tenders

An internal audit document from 2023 on the Nelson Mandela Bay Metro municipality’s street light supply and maintenance tenders revealed a flawed supply chain management process. Archived photo: Mary-Anne Gontsana

• Households in Nelson Mandela Bay Metro have been left in the dark due to dodgy street light tenders, according to a municipal councillor.
• An internal report shows that the municipality bungled two tenders related to street lights. One of which exceeded its budgeted amount by R24-million.
• This follows the Special Investigating Unit’s (SIU) announcement that it would investigate serious maladministration in the municipality.

Most streets in Nelson Mandela Bay Metropolitan Municipality are in the dark following dodgy tenders to supply and maintain street lights across the metro.

This comes as the Special Investigating Unit (SIU) announced this week that it has been given the green light by President Cyril Ramaphosa to investigate “allegations of serious maladministration” at the Nelson Mandela Bay Metropolitan Municipality, to “recover any financial losses”, and also investigate “unlawful or improper conduct by officials” within the municipality.

While the SIU have been tight-lipped about their plans so far, an internal audit document from 2023 on the municipality’s street light supply and maintenance tenders revealed a flawed supply chain management process.

Two tenders connected to street lights were flagged in this internal audit.

The first tender from 2019 – numbered SCM/18-207/C – was for the installation and maintenance of street lights and allocated to three different companies. Preliminary investigations found that the municipality didn’t have enough stock for this tender to be executed by contractors. The report showed that the municipality was aware of this.

The investigation found that the municipality had procured just over R180-million in stock, which exceeded its budget.

Then in 2020, the municipality issued another tender — numbered SCM/20-27/S — also for the supply of street lights to three other companies. The cost of the second tender has not been confirmed.

However, when stock from the 2019 tender was counted in 2020, auditors found that some of it was damaged and could not be used.

This week the SIU stated that it would specifically investigate the SCM/20-27/S tender as well as alleged maladministration and unlawful conduct related to it.

Defenders of the People (DOP) councillor Tukela Zumani told GroundUp that he submitted evidence of corruption to SAPS related to these tenders earlier this year.

The lack of street lights and maintenance of existing lights makes it unsafe for the residents, he said. “Having a city that is almost completely dark is not only unsafe, but also a serious challenge for economic activities,” Zumani said.

“It is mind-boggling how this could be allowed to happen,” said Zumani. He said that if you drive around at night or early in the morning, “the entire city is dark” and that this could not be attributed to vandalism, an excuse used by the municipality, and which GroundUp has reported on.

Wasteful expenditure

According to the 2023 audit report, “The Electricity and Energy Directorate initiated and completed the procurement process … despite being aware that there was no existing contract in place for the supply of materials and that the stock levels of these materials necessary for the successful execution of contract SCM/18-207/C were critically low.”

“This ignorance resulted in the procurement of materials that were not in stock, exceeding the budgeted amount, which expenditure can be deemed as irregular and unauthorised,” it read. The budget on this contract was exceeded by about R24-million.

The report also stated that upon investigation they could not verify the street light installations. The GPS coordinates for installations could not be verified, that Electricity and Energy officials did not have the necessary device to read the GPS coordinates provided by service providers, and that there were no job cards for installations.

“Whilst [Electricity & Energy] officials authorised payments for installations, [Internal Audit] could not verify by means of physical inspection, in some instances the location of streetlights which were allegedly installed,” the report said.

The municipality is yet to respond to our questions sent on Wednesday.

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