Minister Sisulu tries to cover up appointment of Simelane and Shaik

20 January 2020

The Democratic Alliance (DA) revealed last week Friday, 17 January 2020, that Minister of Human Settlements, Water and Sanitation, Lindiwe Sisulu, appointed Menzi Simelane and Mo Shaik as Special Advisors - amongst others - to her Ministerial Office. This information was revealed in a response to a DA Parliamentary Question.

Subsequent to the DA having revealed the names of Sisulu's Ministerial Office and National Rapid Response Task Team (NRRTT) staffers, the Minister today re-issued an amended response to the Parliamentary Question.

Minister Sisulu’s revised response omits all names, gradings and positions of those working in both her office and those appointed to the NRRTT. As such, Simelane and Shaik’s names have been removed from information available to the public.

Minister Sisulu has gone to great lengths to try and cover up the information her office - seemingly erroneously - released.

Minister Sisulu sited in her revised response that “Posts in the Ministry have been filled as outlined in the Guide for Members of the Executive, otherwise commonly referred to as the Ministerial Hand Book”.

It is clear that Minister Sisulu takes the South African public for fools. Not only did the release of staff information on Friday indicate a potentially deliberate attempt to expose her - from within her own Ministry - but her attempts to today retract this information from the public space, exposes her predicament.

She was caught red-handed, employing and appointing individuals with numerous shadows hanging over their names, and now that the public has been made aware of it, she has rapidly attempted to remove access to this information from the public.

It is abundantly clear that Sisulu has staffed herself a political war room at the taxpayer’s expense – with a revolutionary in Chumane Maxwele, a lawyer in Simelane, an intelligence operative in Shaik, and an ex opposition party leader in Ka Plaatjie.

There is little left to be said about Minister Sisulu, her office and the NRRTT.

The Minister has now not only exposed herself, but also the evident cracks within her own office.

It is thus difficult to imagine Minister Sisulu being even remotely capable of handling the drought crisis, when she is clearly preoccupied with covering up the grossly inept appointments to both her office and the NRRTT.

To view the amended version released today, click here.

Issued by Emma Louise Powell, DA Shadow Deputy Minister of Human Settlements, Water and Sanitation, 20 January 2020