Minister Mbalula possibly misled Parliament and must account for expenditure on Mayweather visit

14 January 2016

The DA will approach the Chairperson of the Portfolio Committee on Sport and Recreation to summon the  Minister of Sports and Recreation, Fikile Mbalula, to Parliament to account for his department’s expenditure of almost half a million Rand on Floyd Mayweather's visit to South Africa in 2014 despite his initial claims that the taxpayer did not foot the bill for the trip.

The revelations in documents from Netwerk24's Promotion of Access to Information Act (PAIA) show that Mbalula’s department spent more than R475 950 on advertisements and marketing at a gala function during Mayweather’s visit (see here). 

This is in stark contrast to the Minister's repeated pronouncements that no state money was spent on Floyd Mayweather's Reawakening of the Giant Tour of South Africa. It also flies in the face of claims by the department that the Mayweather visit was privately financed and organised and that the department was asked to participate in a bid to revive boxing in the country.   

Minister Mbalula is even on record in a response to a DA parliamentary question declaring that "the Department did not spend money on Mr Mayweather or his visit to South Africa. In that regard, there is no money incurred by the department in respect of Mr Mayweather's attendance of the (i) Dube boxing event and (ii) gala dinner at Emperors Palace." 

It is now clear from the documents his department supplied to Netwerk24 that Minister Mbalula's claims were incorrect and may in fact be deliberately untruthful. His department has been misleading the public and Parliament about the true cost of Floyd Mayweather's tour for two years with the misguided hope that the story will die.

While we have always been aware, like the rest of South Africa, of Minister Mbalula's groupie love for Floyd Mayweather, we never imagined that the Minister would use taxpayers' money to bring his “razzmatazz” idol to our shores and go to great lengths to deny it until he was compelled by law to reveal the truth.

It is imprudent for the Department of Sport and Recreation to have spent almost half a million on Floyd Mayweather visit to South Africa when boxing in our country remains severely to the extent that amateur boxers often can't provincial and national championships because of lack of adequate government funding. 

Statement issued by Solly Malatsi MP, DA Shadow Minister of Sports and Recreation, 14 January 2016