Multimillion communications contract saga continues: ANC restates its call for the immediate suspension of Ryan Coetzee

The recent DA government debacle in awarding a communications tender estimated of up to R500 million a year without following proper and open tender processes right through comes as no surprise. It is in fact rather indicative of a common and dangerous pattern that has been emerging over the past few years where they have surreptitiously awarded contracts amounting to hundreds of millions of Rand without open tender processes. Let us not forget that the City of Cape Town awarded contracts in excess of R500 million through closed or limited bids (deviations had to be condoned), expansion and extension of contracts

More importantly these allegations are a repetition of the impunity exercised by the DA when it was in power in the early 2000's and awarded contracts through closed / limited bidding processes to companies linked to Ryan Coetzee. The very TBWA\ Hunt Lascaris from Jan 2001 to March 2003 was appointed by the provincial government where Zille was a MEC. Is it a case of repetition?

This debacle is the latest of a litany of examples wherein the DA has disregarded the principles of good governance, openness and transparency which it so often claims to be guardians of. At best it is hypocrisy of the worst type and at worst it is systematic and institutionalised corruption and a flagrant disregard of due process.

Zille owes it to the people of the Western Cape to deal firmly with the culprits and take responsibility for what amounts to a breach of good governance and gross violation of the codes of best practice. Instead she resorts to cowering behind cries of conspiracy when she is called upon to account for crises of governance when she is confronted (both in her party the DA and in her government). Her consistent cries of alleged conspiracies against her and Party is becoming old and weary and can no longer provide umbrage against gross failures and a blight on the "squeaky clean" image that her government expediently lays claim to.

This has been her response in the recent service delivery protest against this DA government as well as her consistent cries that the ANC was attempting to topple her coalition when she was mayor, to mention but a few.

The facts that are emerging clearly indicate that the Premier and her Political Advisor Mr Ryan Coetzee together with his party apparatchiks Nick Clelland Stokes amongst others controlled and manipulated a government communications tender.

The Premier must explain to this house why she continues to defend a process of awarding a multimillion rand tender that is filled with serious irregularities, unauthorised, fruitless and wasteful expenditure, and scant regard of government procurement regulations, due process and unethical behaviour from start to end.

We need to know why the Premier has allowed Coetzee the space to bully bureaucrats into supporting and regularising a flawed, irregular and inefficient process. The fact of the matter is that Coetzee's presence and hand throughout this process amounted to subtle, sophisticated as well as at times forceful intimidation and influence over bureaucrats

The Premier must explain why she allowed Coetzee:

Not to accept the advice and assistance from the Provincial Treasury in the procurement process. This resulted in a fruitless and wasteful expenditure when it messed up the original open tender process.

Thereafter instead of procuring the services of the Provincial Treasury and/or her CFO's office appointed a private consultant to facilitate the appointment of TWA; and

Finally, they irregularly, procedurally and unethically bulldozed the expansion of the contract to all line function departments.

No matter how the Premier spins this matter the reality is that the there is a number of irregular and unethical practises in this process from start to end. These include:

1.  A flawed open tender process for the original DOTP contract which resulted in it being cancelled three times over and thus resulting in a fruitless and wasteful expenditure;

2.  The appointment of consultant Yardstick to facilitate the process instead of using the in-house expertise of the Provincial Treasury;

3.  The irregular tactics to expand the contract quantitatively by directing departments to appoint the same company and expanding the contract qualitatively to include all media and communication activities; and

4.  Pushing for what amounts to a transversal tender without quantifying the total cost.

The Premier claims that the provincial government is the most efficient in country and that the government is based on the twin principals of accountability and transparency. If this is the case then the underlying question is why she has allowed her advisor to so ruthlessly implement this process.  

Given the gravity of the allegations and in the interest of good governance and accountability we call upon the premier to allow the Public Protector and the National Treasury amongst other legislative agencies to immediately investigate the entire process. This will ensure that the investigation is not only impartial but seen to be objective as well.

Secondly, the ANC calls for the immediately suspension of her political advisor Ryan Coetzee until the investigation has been finalised. This call is a precautionary measure given the allegations of his propensity to intervene both at a political and administrative level. His mere presence in her office will result in the intimidation of potential witnesses and collection of evidence and taint the process. Further the ANC calls on all officials to come clean on this matter by revealing all relevant information they may hold. Justice must not only be done, but seen to be done.

Statement issued by Fezile Calan, ANC Western Cape Provincial Secretary, and Pierre Uys, spokesperson on corruption, August 28 2011

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