Light at end of tunnel over shack blazes

Cape Town - Luthando Klaas stands in a pitch dark shack, the consulting room for his work as a traditional healer.

He lifts his hand to the roof, tugs at a black plastic packet and, the room fills with light. The light is not harsh and electric, but soft and natural.

Klaas, a resident of Mtshini Wam informal settlement in Joe Slovo Park, is South Africa’s first recipient of a “litre of light,” a low-tech device which feeds natural light through a watertight hole in the roof of a tin shack.

The device was pioneered in the shacklands of Indonesia, and knowledge of its simplicity and effectiveness is now being spread to informal settlements across the world.

It consists of three simple, cheap ingredients: water, a recycled plastic bottle and a few spoonfuls of bleach.

“This is going to be great for business. I have to close the door for privacy during consultations, but people – especially those from other cultures – get a bit creeped out by all these things in the dark,” says Klaas, pointing to the muti and calabashes on the ground.

“Besides, now I can keep an eye on my pet snake. He won’t be able to creep up on me so easily any more.”

Klaas is one of the leading members in Mtshini Wam’s reblocking initiative. In a few short months the cluttered, dense informal settlement has been systematically demolished and rebuilt. Clusters of shacks now huddle around easily accessible open spaces.

The idea is that areas for recreation double up as arteries for basic services – fire trucks, ambulances, sanitation – to be able to penetrate into the community.

“Shack fires were a big problem in this area before,” said Khaya Nozombile, another recipient of a litre of light in his shack nearby.

The litre of light has allowed Nozobile and Klaas to refrain from using candles – a common cause of shack fires around Cape Town – during the day.

The community-based reblocking initiative is being facilitated by Cape Town’s branch of Shack Dwellers International and the Community Organisation Resource Centre.

On Thursday, these organisations were joined by Touching the Earth Lightly, an eco-design company, and students at Worcester Polytechnic Institute, from the US, to demonstrate to City of Cape Town officials the potential for transforming informal settlements into more habitable areas where the risk of fires is greatly reduced.

With the litre of light, Touching the Earth Lightly’s arsenal includes a vertical vegetable garden which runs up the outside wall of a shack. The irrigation system kept the plants nourished and acted as an additional barrier to spreading fires, explained the company’s Stephen Lamb.

“The city has been looking for innovative ways to reduce shack fires and to get services to informal settlements within our boundaries,” said JP Smith, the mayoral committee member for safety and security.

“I am very proud of Mtshini Wam community. This is exactly the sort of thing that we would like to see happening in other informal settlements.”

The different organisations involved in the reblocking and “greenblocking” (to use Lamb’s term) of Mtshini Wam will be petitioning the city to fund a wider roll-out of this initiative.

- Cape Argus

Cape Town is ready to be the World Design Capital in 2014

If I had to reflect for a moment on what the city I am proud to lead would look like if we had to design and build it from scratch, it would probably look very different. 

But even though Cape Town, like all South African cities, has a particular history, we are not the only city that might have designed itself differently. 

With few exceptions, the modern city has risen largely out of necessity, being added to or made more complex by the needs of the moment. 

This is an issue that still confronts us, especially with the pressures of urbanisation and the global shift towards cities becoming major drivers of economic growth. 

Living with these historical realities and daily challenges, we are left with cities that are often far from perfect. 

But that is the beauty of innovation. 

It is the beauty of design. 

We know we are moving in the right direction to get to our ideal. 

Or at least, we are designing our city, in as much as we can, working with what we have, in order to do so. 

For me, this is the central thesis of the City of Cape Town’s approach to the World Design Capital 2014: Excellence in design is using what you have to realise what you want. 

It is designing the change we want to see in our city using the very building blocks of which our city is comprised. 

It is these realities that help us focus on the outcomes we want to see for 2014. 

Ours is, in relative global terms of population and economic power, a mid-size city at the tip of Africa. 

We have incredible advantages, especially in terms of our geographical location and our relative competitive advantage in terms of infrastructure. 

But we also face the same challenges as many developing-world cities. 

These challenges include urbanisation, growing population sizes, urban decay and ever present socio-economic pressures. 

But in as much as we feel the effects of these challenges, our city is faced with another difficulty. 

That is, the problem of apartheid spatial planning. 

The emphasis of apartheid was placed on separating people physically. 

Indeed, this was the most direct action of decades of social engineering. 

And as such, we have a city that still bears the strong legacy of racial separation, as do all cities in South Africa. 

While we are aware that the reality of divided cities is not unique to our country, there is a very particular racial dimension to these divisions that is. 

While many cities have felt the effects of bad planning, or class divisions, or a lack of transport options, we do live with the effects of an unjust policy of physical separation of individuals according to race. 

And that is what I find so exciting about design. 

I find the possibility of exploring truly innovative ways to change our city, and its artificial divisions, exciting. 

While it is true that apartheid has been gone for two decades, we still have a lot of work to do in eradicating its legacy. 

We are doing everything we can to change our city every day, from major investments in public transportation and broadband infrastructure to rolling out the most expansive public works programme in the country. 

However, we have to complement these large-scale interventions with the innovative solutions that design can bring to change cities. 

Click picture for Cannabrick design

Whether it is the design of new housing structures for lower-income groups; to facilities for the urbanising population joining us in search of a better life; to amenities that creatively bring people together across old boundaries, design can truly change our city. 

In conclusion, we need to harness the creative potential of design and bring people together to help us find solutions by unleashing the energy of being the World Design Capital for 2014. 

Then we can speak with a new honesty when we say: live design, transform life. 

In conclusion, using these principles, and the realisation that design is based on organic networks of change that transform the city, not centralised plans, I believe we can transform Cape Town. 

Our structures are in place, our people are ready and our city is waiting. 

Cape Town is ready to be the World Design Capital in 2014. 

- Mayor Partica de Lille

Guptas 'bankroll' Mrs Zuma's bond

There is evidence that the Gupta family is helping first lady number four, Bongi Ngema-Zuma, pay off her R3.8-million home loan.

Although the Guptas deny being involved, the circumstances around the bond's initiation and billing - and the very large monthly repayments - suggest their helping hand. This should raise new concern about  the Guptas' close relationship with Zuma and his family.

Set on the exclusive Waterkloof Ridge that overlooks Pretoria and the Union Buildings, the property was bought in April 2010 for R5.2-million.

Before the purchase, said a person with first-hand knowledge, the president personally inspected the sprawling property. According to a neighbour, he visits regularly.

The purchase was completed in August 2010, when the property was transferred to the Sinqumo Trust and the R3.8-million bond registered. The trust is controlled by Ngema-Zuma and named after the couple's son.

Public bond records show that the trust was to pay off the bond over five years, a remarkably short period for a home loan of this value. To do so, it committed to paying about R80,000 every month.

Fingerprints

There are three sets of Gupta fingerprints on the transaction:

• The first print is that the bond was granted by India's Bank of Baroda, which has a known relationship with the Guptas.
• The Bank of Baroda also holds the bond on another house closely linked to both the Guptas and the Zuma family, one of which the president's son, Duduzane, calls home. Situated in Saxonwold, Johannesburg, the property is formally owned by Mabengela Investments, controlled jointly by Duduzane Zuma and Tony Gupta.
• And in January 2011, at a high profile South Africa-India cricket event part-sponsored by Gupta-owned newspaper The New Age, President Zuma handed the bank's managing director an award, apparently for fostering bilateral relations.
•  The second, clearer fingerprint is a witness signature on the bond ­documents by a trusted Gupta lieutenant, Ronica Govender. Govender is something of a factotum to the Gupta family. Company records reflect her as a director in more than a dozen ­family companies.  She is financial director at the family's flagship IT company, Sahara, a receptionist said this week. She is also listed as special-projects director at JIC Mining Services, a company majority-owned by the Guptas and Duduzane Zuma. Govender this week said her signature on the bond was "irrelevant as anyone can witness this type of document in their personal capacity".
•  Fingerprint number three is the freshest: on inquiry this week, a bank employee gave Govender's JIC Mining email address when asked where the bank dispatched the Sinqumo Trust bond statements to. Govender responded that this was "absolute rubbish and even if it was being sent to me,  that's not a crime".
• Last year, when the Mail & Guardian exposed how JIC Mining had employed Ngema, then still the president's fiancée, as head of communications and marketing, the newspaper asked Gupta family spokesperson Gary Naidoo whether the family had "in any way assisted

Ngema or her family in acquiring [the property] by helping to pay the purchase price, facilitating financing, or meeting or assisting with bond repayments".

Naidoo's written denial was an emphatic "no to all your questions", flying in the face of the choice of financial institution and evidence of Govender's facilitating role.

Naidoo and JIC Mining this week repeated the denials, saying: "The Gupta family or its businesses deny any involvement in any employee's personal dealings with any institution. Therefore, there should be no confusion that we contributed in any way to the raising or paying of the bond for Ms Ngema-Zuma."

Affordable?

However, the question remains how either the president or Ngema-Zuma could afford to pay off the bond at the stipulated rate.

Usually, prospective homeowners cannot secure bonds in which repayments exceed 30% of their gross income.

In other words, to afford the R80 000 monthly instalments, Ngema-Zuma would need to earn about R3.2-million a year, which is unlikely. Even the presidential salary falls far short of this.

In 2010, Zuma was paid only R2.4-million and the higher than average size of his immediate family and his ostensible financial commitments at Nkandla suggest that even the standard bond payment-to-income ratio would be too high for him to afford.

His history of relying on others to support his family is well known.

His loans from arms-deal convict Schabir Shaik and Durban businessman Vivien Reddy provide well-known examples. In another, after media exposure, Zuma disclosed in his 2009 Cabinet interest declaration that a businessperson provided, for free, a luxury home for the use of another of his wives in Durban.

The impression that the Guptas are assisting the Zumas with the Waterkloof Ridge bond was tacitly confirmed to the M&G by an insider to the relationship between the families. He cannot be named as the conversation was off the record.

No declaration

Although neighbours confirmed that Zuma had visited the house regularly during 2012, the president declared neither the home nor a third-party benefit in the open part of his last two Cabinet declarations.

Cabinet ministers are allowed to declare spousal benefits confidentially. However, any assistance received in securing this bond and facilitating repayment could arguably be construed as a direct benefit to Zuma.

Neither the presidency nor Ngema-Zuma replied to questions.

And so began the winter of their content

April 2010, when Bongi Ngema went home-shopping in Waterkloof Ridge, was a time of blossoming relationships.

Only four months earlier the future Mrs Ngema-Zuma had presented umbondo – traditional wedding gifts – to President Jacob Zuma at his Nkandla estate, and now she was next in line to marry him.

On another front, the Gupta family and Zuma's son, Duduzane, seemed poised to consummate large-scale commercial success. The events of that time would also lead to great controversy regarding the cosy relationship between the Gupta and Zuma families.

In March 2010, Gupta lieutenant Jagdish Parekh acquired a 50% stake in Imperial Crown Trading 289, which soon became a household name as news emerged that it had grabbed the right to prospect at the Sishen iron ore mine from under the noses of corporate giants Kumba Iron Ore and ArcelorMittal.

Imperial Crown's "squatting" at Sishen, fully supported by the government despite evidence of fraud in the awarding of the right, put the Guptas and Zuma Jr in the position to negotiate an empowerment deal with ArcelorMittal, announced in August 2010. From this Parekh was to score shares and cash with a face value of over R2billion, with Zuma Jr pocketing more than R900-million and a Gupta family investment company R450-million-plus.

That deal eventually fell apart, but there were other Gupta-Zuma pokers in the fire: April 2010 also saw a consortium led by the Guptas and Duduzane Zuma buy Toronto-listed Uranium One's South African assets in a R300-million deal, placing them well to tap into South Africa's expected expansion of nuclear power generation.

Zuma Jr, who had completed an internship at the Gupta family's Sahara computer business, seems to have entered a formal business relationship with the family in mid-2008, when he and Tony Gupta formed investment company Mabengela Investments.

In a 2010 interview, Zuma Jr called Tony Gupta his "exclusive" partner who advised him financially and legally.

Mabengela and a Gupta family company are the controlling shareholders of JIC Mining Services. Bongi Ngema-Zuma has been employed in marketing and communications at JIC since mid-2010.

The Guptas have consistently denied impropriety in their friendship with the president and their business relationship with members of his family. – Stefaans Brümmer & Craig McKune

Living in the lap of luxury

Of all the mansions on Grus Street in Waterkloof Ridge, Bongi Ngema-Zuma's is the most distinctly African. A pair of earthenware pots the size of grown men flanks the front door and the walls are a rich, bright yellow.

Ngema-Zuma is also one of the few environmentally conscious homeowners on this street, with two large solar panels perched on her roof.

A neighbour who had been inside the property before Ngema-Zuma moved in described it as "big and luxurious". He added that it had "a massive swimming pool with a fish tank inside".

But small piles of bricks, cement and plastic sheeting inside the property suggest it is undergoing some renovations.

A security watchtower decked out with CCTV cameras looks out over the street, but no guards were manning it when the Mail & Guardian visited this week, and the mansion had an unoccupied feel.

The neighbour said Jacob Zuma had visited at least 10 times in the past nine months, but "at most" spent the night twice. When he visits, Zuma is accompanied by up to 12 black SUVs, which disgorge a number of bodyguards who line the street, keeping a watchful eye.

"They're not that invasive, and tend to let us go about our own business," said the neighbour. – Sally Evans & Lionel Faull

* M&G Got a tip-off for us about this story? Email amabhungane@mg.co.za

Specific Nkandla budget was not required, says Gordhan

THE Department of Public Works used an existing baseline for the expenditure on the work on President Jacob Zuma’s homestead in Nkandla and was therefore not required to submit a specific budget bid for the project to the Cabinet, Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan said on Thursday.

He also said the Department of Public Works had details of the expenditure on the project, despite repeated attempts by Public Works Minister Thulas Nxesi to evade questions about the costs involved, estimated to be more than R230m.

Mr Nxesi has announced various investigations into the project.

Replying in writing to a question in Parliament by Congress of the People leader Mosiuoa Lekota, Mr Gordhan said the Cabinet approved the national budget based on the recommendations of the ministers committee on the budget. The budget was then tabled in Parliament, which subsequently approved it.

Mr Lekota wanted to know whether the Treasury in the budget preparation process had approved the expenditure on the Nkandla project.

- BD Live

The road to Nkuntlatara

Terry Crawford-Browne referred to South Africa’s infamous arms deal as the country’s “golden calf”, a reference stemming from the biblical construction of the Israelites whilst Moses hiked Mount Sinai. It also serves as an ironic metaphor to the phrase “...the road to hell is paved with good intentions...”

The now famous Crawford–Browne is best known for his efforts in campaigning against the arms deal from its inception in 1999, citing its wastefulness and true purpose as the origin of large scale corruption in the country.

According to many, me included, the arms deal was nothing more than a veil to mask money laundering in an effort to raise funds for the impoverished cadres of the ANC.

It was obvious that 1990’s S.A did not have a place in the sun for every ANC member who took part in the “struggle”, and that these people needed to be thanked for their support during the opposition of apartheid, hence the need to purchase expensive and unnecessary military equipment at inflated prices.

Some of the funds were raised by selling off South Africa’s massive stockpile of semi-crude oil stored in Langebaan by the previous National Party government; a product of the need for total independence during the sanction years, and a commodity deemed unnecessary by the ANC as economic barriers evaporated after the 1994 elections.

The problem with the arms deal is simply that it is the origin of most of what is wrong with present day South Africa, as pretty much all of the major issues at hand at the moment is either directly or indirectly linked to the cover-up of one of the biggest instances of white collar crime in the history of the country.

When one considers issues like the Protection of State Information Bill (‘the Info Bill’), E-Tolling, the sacking of Thabo Mbeki, the shroud of corruption and fraud charges surrounding Jacob Zuma, wasteful spending of public funds, tender fraud and the concept of “cadre deployment”, then the common thread becomes alarmingly evident.

The info Bill is designed to lock away inconvenient details of the arms deal, E-Tolling is installed and operated by the Austrian based Kapsch TrafficCom, part of a consortium of firms with their majority shareholding vesting with the Swedish weapons manufacturers involved in the arms deal.

In a logic baffling move, Thabo Mbeki was forced to step down as president only months before his second term ended, simply because he fired Zuma for his apparent involvement in the arms deal via Shabir Shaik.

The concept of money making the rounds to the benefit of ANC ‘cadres’ established a culture of wastefulness in government, and anyone caught with their hands in the cookie jar since the arms deal, only received a gentle slap on the wrists due to their intimate knowledge of the grand plan; just ask Tony Yengeni.

 The simple fact of the matter is that Zuma can ill afford not to be president, for the sake of his own liberty as well as most of the current top brass in the ANC. It was as clear as day that Mbeki wouldn’t protect them when he sacked Zuma without consultation.

This brings us to the latest scandal to hit the country... Nkandla!

As the literate part of South Africa is surely aware by now, Zuma’s publicists have been enduring a hellish nightmare during the past months over the Nkandla saga, and the apparent miss-appropriation of public funds on the president’s private residence to the tune of R250 mil.

Various government officials made the effort to shower the media with explanations and threats, none of which makes any sense, simply re-enforcing the suspicion that something is amiss.

However, I recently received an article via e-mail by Mybroadband, where the freeway running through Nkandla was placed under scrutiny. One needs to remember that the only reason this freeway was built, was so the president could access the compound quickly and easily... at a cool R 1.5 Billion... (Yes, with a B)

The department of Public Works claims that a private company by the name of Korong Capital Partners is building the freeway at its own cost, and will donate the road to the government on completion.

Public works goes further in their explanation by stating that Korong is what is referred to as an “Angel Investor” and simply feels the need to contribute to the government, and Zuma in particular, at a loss of R1.5 Billion to itself. It also appears that the freeway funding originated from the U.S.A, via an American attorney.

However, the startling portion of the story only starts to unravel from here...

It appears that the only director of Korong Capital is an S.A resident who failed to qualify for a R1 mil loan, yet succeeded in securing R1.5 Billion to build to freeway so it can be donated thereafter. It also appears that the registered address of Korong is a 60 square metre flat in Sunning Hill, Johannesburg... not the type of place a Billion rand company operates from...

Then, the kicker... the Sunning Hill flat is owned by none other than the manager of the Housing Development Agency of South Africa, bringing the trail of suspicion to full circle.

So... what is the link to the arms deal?

Well, Korong Capital was a shelf company registered in 1999, and remained dormant in South Africa until the freeway construction through Nkandla.

The arms deal was initiated in 1999, marking the dawn of a new era in South Africa. It thus appears that Korong is simply a vessel created with the sole purpose of laundering money, making it appear as if the funds originated from a third party.

Where the money came from initially remains a mystery, but one can only speculate as to the probability. My submission is that these funds formed part of the initial arms deal, paid by the government all those years ago.

It was a simple case of inflated invoicing so the money could leave the country, just to end up in a suspense account in a foreign bank and earning interest, under the beneficiary name of Korong Capital Investments.

The worst of it is that this may only be the tip of the iceberg, as many dormant shelf companies could exist with the same purpose... no one would know, unless the full details of the arms deal is exposed.  

The further suspicion arises that billions in arms deal money was laundered in the same manner, finding its way into accounts held in the names of shelf companies in various banks across the world, from Zurich to the Cayman Islands.

In return, many of the weapons contractors were paid in the Freeway Improvement Project, loosely referred to as the E-Tolling saga. From a business perspective, it makes sense to settle for less if you’re operating a lucrative contract such as E-Tolling, which also explains the inflated rates initially advertised.

It seems then that the road the country and the ANC followed with the arms deal is leading through many supplementary problems, forcing the guilty to cover their tracks. It could snowball the cover-up to such a point where the inevitable flight or fight point will force the bad apples out, or rot the entire country to its core.

So... going full circle and getting back to the road to hell being paved with good intentions... it seems the phrase could also read that bad intentions will most certainly lead down the same path... either to hell, or Nkandla!

- news24

Gedleyihlekisa Ncipoesa eShowera o'Hara of Nkuntlatara

nciphisa is red in isiZulu...

Gedleyihlekisa o'Hara, or Ncipoesa as everyone but his father calls him, has dark hair, and a wide face and frame. He is an  atypical protagonist, especially as a male romantic lead in friction. 

When the story opens, Ncipoesa is a young terrorist.

He is vain, self-centered, somewhat spoiled, can be insecure, and is an unintelligent, dim minded, self-taught unschooled young man.

He stands out in that he is louder than and very much unlike the typical party-going amagents around him.

He can be a high-strung busybody for someone with such dance moves and song, with women he loves, he can go into a mode where he is both babyish and over-thinks little things, like “what's this kids name?”

On the outside he seems charming, busy, good, and smart; but on the inside he is insecure and just wants the affection of his neighbour, the Shaiks. He makes surface efforts to live up to the expectations his culture demands, by wearing an endangered  leopard skin over a purple western garment and sacrificing 12 cows to the ancestors ~ in the hope of keeping his job and house; but fears discovery by society of his love for Nike's and his true self. 

Ncipoesa, has deep affection for Reddy Shaikes, reed dances and wishes to marry annually, despite a tradition in his family to marry within spheres of influence. Ncipoesa's motivation in the early part of the yarn centers on his desire to win the affection of Gertrude, despite that fact; Ncipoesa liked many other suitors; and over the years expressed his manly feelings to Nkosazana, Kate, Nompumelelo, Thobeka, Gloria, Sebentile, Minah, Priscilla, Josie1, Richardsbay1, Sonono and the irresistable short kanga'd Fezeka Khuzwayo. 

One of the wives hears Ncipoesa expressing his true feelings for Sonono, during a braai at Shabby's estate. Sonono and Fezeka admire and are interested in the willful umalume Ncipoesa, and pursue him through a romantic umalume (uncle) friendship when he divorces Nkosazana, helping him to ignore Zulu conventions and become active in society again; with an arranged labolla agreement of (inhlawulo) the transfer of live stock by elders. Emotions run high in the harem when they hear Ncipoesa paid 10 cows for the Swazi Princess.

Apartheid is ultimately blamed by disapproving society, and Ncipoesa finds his friendship with Mac liberating. Urgently requiring a wedding planner; Ncipoesa summons his Agricultural minister back from abroad; Tina packs the children and servant and flees on the most expensive gravyplane back to Nkuntlatara to make the flower arrangements (flowers are agricultural you see). She returns abroad to her winter home with kids and servant after the flowers are packed away to conclude their European white xmas, the way they like it.

After the white madam's visit at Nkuntlatara, Ncipoesa's character hardens, when he is burdened by his parliament asking questions about the rooms in the houses he uses; his family, servants, the Shaiks & Reddy family, and the fear of homelessness and starvation, and not having a bond. 

This causes him to become extremely money-conscious and materialistic. His motivation is to assure that no one close to him faces the threat of starvation or not having a thatch rondavel inside the family plantation of Nkuntlatara.

As such, he engages in controversial business / arms deal / cheque writing practices and exploits apartheid national key point acts, and milking the ministry of public works and the Ministerial handbook for every non-punishable nuance his no school-book education could afford, in order to build his Estate, rented and run by the  Ingonyama Trust, in defiance of his countries needs, and with a higher profit margin.

 After the next reed dance, he marries Sheamoungus for "fun" (because now he can say he's had Octopussy) and because she is very wealthy. Unfortunately, Ncipoesa is too insecure and vain to realize his pursuit of Sheamoungus was misdirected until the climax of the tale. With the un-death of his pal Shabby Shaik, he realizes his pursuit of a bond was in vain and FNB would never give him one.

Ncipoesa realizes he never really needed a bond after all, and that Nkuntlatara would be built with Prestige A grade haste after he redeployed the ministers of Public works.

 Mpindamshaye "I will beat you up again" in isiZulu, the 1st upgraded, and is a loved family Estate...

 But Nkuntlatara is Ncipoesa's homeland where he shames his ancestors with extravagance and his true home. Ncipoesa returns home to the family bunker and is preparing to face those who poke fund at Ncipoesa, Ncipoesa Bond, and plans to attract angel investors anew to complete the highway too Nkuntlatara...

South Africans fear Zuma might be financial idiot rather than crook

As Jacob Zuma continues to deny any prior knowledge of R250-million upgrades to his Nkandla not-compound, South Africans say he is innocent until proven guilty. “Which is even more depressing,” explained a spokesman. “Because it implies that the man in charge of our national finances has Grade R maths skills and is more or less catatonic.”

Zuma has insisted that he had no knowledge of the state’s decision to spend hundreds of millions of Rands on his not-compound.

“The President, Lord Of All Elephants And Master Of The Lightning, knows nothing about this project,” explained a spokesman. “He knows nothing about how tax money is spent. He knows nothing about accounting in general. He knows nothing about all sorts of things. Pretty much everything. In fact, I cannot stress enough to you how little the President knows. Imagine knowing nothing about anything, then halve it, and that’s more than he knows.”

This morning, South Africans agreed that Zuma was innocent until proven guilty, but that this position threw up some “horrifying new possibilities”.

“If we accept that he didn’t steal taxpayers’ money, then we have to accept that he really didn’t have a clue about what was happening in his own back yard,” explained legal expert, Prima Faycee. “I can’t speak for Mr Zuma, but to be that clueless about your surroundings, and that naïve about money – well, that would take a very special kind of imbecile.”

She said she found it “alarming” that the man in charge of all state expenditure apparently had the financial acumen of “three-year-old in a sweet shop”.

However, the Presidency hit back, saying that Zuma was making “massive strides” in his financial literacy course.

“We are already onto Season 3 of Takalani Sesame, where we learn how to count up to 30, which is obviously hard because you need fingers, toes, and then another set of toes,” explained Presidency tutor, Professor Calculus Cele. “But Comrade Blade Nzimande is always happy to lend us his toes. Even if he does sometimes threaten the numbers with re-education if they don’t add up the way he wants.”

Cele added that Zuma had shown an interest in counting-based games, including Monopoly, but said that there had been “some hiccups”.

“He said Monopoly was just like real life, because you get handed lots of money at the start without having to make it yourself, and then you slowly spend it on big houses,” he said. “However, he demanded that we cover up the ‘Go Directly To Jail’ block, as it was counterrevolutionary and racist.”

- hayibo

Fires raze shacks in five city areas

Cape Town - Negligence and handling a fire or electrical appliances while intoxicated are among the main causes of fires in Cape Town’s informal settlements, says city disaster management spokesman Wilfred Solomons- Johannes.

He was speaking on Sunday after several shack fires left more than 300 people homeless across the city at the weekend.

Solomons-Johannes said structures were destroyed in Seawinds, Athlone, Milnerton, Langa and Philippi.

He said most of the fires occurred in the early hours of the morning.

The city’s disaster response teams assisted the fire victims with food parcels, hot meals, clothing, blankets and building material. No one was injured.

When the Cape Argus visited the informal settlement in Langa on Sunday, residents were clearing debris and trying to rebuild their homes.

Ncediwe Makiva, a mother of a two-month-old baby, said she had lost everything in the blaze.

She had been living in the shack for five years.

“It’s the first time my house has burnt down. I feel so sad right now,” Makiva said.

Solomons-Johannes said the cause of the fires was still unclear.

He said there had been a noticeable reduction in shack fires this year compared to the previous year, thanks to fire safety awareness campaigns the city had run throughout the year.

“We are doing our utmost by engaging with the community regularly, but it’s also up to them to prevent those [fires] from happening by being vigilant,” he said.

Solomons-Johannes said most fires were caused by unattended cigarettes, matches, lighters, candles, and cooking and heating appliances.

Earlier this month, two people were killed in a shack fire in Joe Slovo Park, Milnerton.

Days earlier, 43 people were left homeless in Scottsville, Kraaifontein. Five days later another 43 people were displaced in separate fires in Strand, Lotus River and Parkwood Estate.

On October 28, a child burnt to death in a shack fire at the Kosovo informal settlement in Philippi. Three men aged between 30 and 40 died in separate fires in Khayelitsha and Heideveld in August. One fire was caused by an unattended electrical stove.

City fire and rescue spokesman Theo Layne said the city had enough manpower and resources to deal with the recent spate of fires.

“There are some periods where there are more incidents than others, like now, but we have enough resources to handle them,” he said.

How to prevent shack fires:

• Keep a close eye on paraffin stoves. Don’t cook near a window with a curtain.
• Make sure candles are secure and can’t fall over. Don’t go to sleep with candles still burning.
• Teach children about the dangers of fire.
• Watch out for discarded cigarette butts.
• Be aware of the dangers of illegal and faulty electricity connections, which also cause fires.
• Keep a bucket handy to fill with water so you can extinguish flames easily.
• Keep a bucket of sand to put out paraffin fires.
• Build dwellings a good distance (at least 3m) apart to prevent fires from spreading throughout the area. Make sure this space is kept open for emergency purposes.

- Cape Argus

Nkandla improvements to stay: Cwele

Improvements made to President Jacob Zuma's Nkandla compound will not be halted or removed when his term as president ends, it was reported on Monday.

State Security Minister Siyabonga Cwele, responding to a question from Beeld newspaper, said while it was too early to speculate on the issue, it made no sense to remove any of the improvements at a later stage.

"The safety measures installed at (former president PW) Botha's home ... I do not believe were removed when he was no longer the leader," Cwele reportedly told the newspaper..

Cwele was asked if the amount of R250 million linked to the Nkandla development was accurate.

"The minister of public works is busy with an investigation. It shouldn't take long, but it has to be thorough. Part of the investigation will look at whether proper procedures were followed, and prices are being inflated."

Meanwhile deputy health minister Gwen Ramokgopa has admitted that the private clinic being built for Zuma at Nkandla would not be accessible for the local community.

In addition to the clinic, Zuma would also have access to a 24-hour fire and emergency service.

- timeslive

Interactive timeline: Nkandlagate

Interactive timeline: Nkandlagate: 10 key developments in one of the stories of the year.

Dozens homeless after Cape fires

At least 79 people were left homeless after fires at five informal settlements in the Western Cape this weekend, the disaster risk management centre reported on Sunday.

The centre’s spokesperson, Wilfred Solomons-Johannes, said they attended to fires in the Lotus River, Langa, Milnerton, Khayelitsha and Kraaifontein areas.

The Milnerton blaze, which occurred on Saturday evening, left the biggest disaster.

“The fire destroyed 16 shacks at the Siyahlala informal settlement. As a result, 36 people (including seven children) were left displaced,” said Solomons-Johannes.

He said disaster management teams were providing food parcels, blankets, clothing and building material to those who were affected.

It was unclear what sparked the blazes. - Sapa

Fires bluster through Cape shack dwellings

ABOUT 300 people have been left homeless after their shacks caught fire in areas across the Western Cape, the City's disaster risk management centre says.

Spokesperson Wilfred Solomons-Johannes says fires at Seawinds, Athlone, Langa and Phillipi destroyed shacks and interrupted power supply yesterday morning.

No injuries were reported.

The cause of the fires is not known, but authorities are investigating, he says.

- Sunday World

Shack blazes leave over 300 homeless

More than 300 people were left homeless after their shacks were destroyed by fires across the city yesterday. No one was injured.

The city’s Fire and Rescue and Disaster Risk Management teams and the Human Settlements Department responded to blazes in Seawinds, Athlone, Milnerton, Langa and Philippi, Disaster Management spokesman Wilfred Solomons-Johannes said.

“At 3.25am fire gutted 60 informal structures at the Overcome Heights informal settlement in Seawinds and 240 people were left homeless. The fire also damaged the overhead electricity infrastructure that caused an interruption in the power supply. Technicians are restoring the service in the area,” he said.

Rescue workers also attended to the scene of a fire in Athlone, in which one house was damaged, and about 30 minutes later six shacks were destroyed by a fire at the Doornback informal settlement near Milnerton, leaving 10 people homeless.

After 8am, 27 structures were destroyed when a fire broke out on the corner of Washington Road and Vanguard Drive in Langa, displacing 69 people. In Philippi, one person was left homeless when a shack caught alight on Highfield Road at 10.51am. - The Weekend Argus

Top-secret documents lay bare the pressure placed on Public Works

The state did not only pay for security upgrades when it spent R248 million on President Jacob Zuma’s Nkandla compound.

City Press can reveal that the department of public works also used taxpayers’ money to build the following:

• A culvert (tunnel) for cattle;
• New homes for three families who had to be relocated due to the Nkandla development;
• An entrance road to Zuma’s residence; and
• A tuck shop.

Correspondence by consecutive former Public Works ministers Geoff Doidge and Gwen Mahlangu-Nkabinde, and senior Public Works officials, lay bare the frantic rush with which the project was pushed through – and that Zuma was kept abreast of the extent of the upgrades.

It also raises questions about whether Doidge’s abrupt axing by Zuma in October 2010 was related to delays in completing the project. 

Doidge is now South Africa’s ambassador to Sri Lanka and declined to comment. 

The correspondence and other top-secret documents, including a cost analysis that shows Zuma was supposed to pay R23 million for the construction of two brand-new houses, were leaked to City Press this week.

At the end of last year, Public Works estimated Zuma’s personal contribution to the entire project at R10.6 million.

A sequence of events in October and November 2010 clearly shows the great pressure placed on Public Works to finalise the development.

This led to Doidge himself attending site visits at Nkandla and meeting with building suppliers to fast-track the project.

 

A flurry of activity was triggered by a progress report prepared by the Durban office of Public Works for “Prestige Project A” – the name of the Nkandla upgrade – on September 8 2010.

The report stated that the aim of the project was to provide “security measures and supporting facilities for the current head of state at his private residence”.

The project was “divided into building works carried out by the owner (Zuma) and works carried out by the state”. 

Work on Zuma’s side “had progressed far and was now being held up by the state’s progress, thus necessitating high-level intervention”, the report read.

The Public Works project was divided into three contracts: the main contract for building works, emergency works and a negotiated contract.

The main contract included groundwork, the construction of a private clinic, the construction of a security bunker and control centre, and the building of houses for Zuma’s bodyguards.

The emergency works included the construction of a guard house, tuck shop and toilets; the relocation of two families; and the upgrading of “safe havens” in existing homes.

The negotiated contract was awarded for security installations in Zuma’s new residences, for the relocation of another family and for the construction of “safe havens” between the president’s new houses, “complete with protected walkway”.

At the time, the total cost of construction was estimated to be more than R100 million.

Public Works’ call for “high-level intervention” resulted in Doidge attending an emergency progress meeting at Nkandla on September 23 2010. 

He was accompanied by his then director-general, Siviwe Dongwana; Surgeon-General Vejay Ramlakan; other high-level Public Works officials; and contractors, including Minenhle Makhanya, a Durban-based architect who is identified as the “principal agent”.

A Public Works official was instructed not to follow procurement processes, but to “issue a direct order for the supply/manufacture” of bullet-resistant glass on the same day.

Doidge “pointed out that unnecessary delays are not acceptable”.

He also raised his concerns regarding the time left to finish interior design works, without saying for which buildings.

Makhanya pointed out that designers required not less than two weeks for completion of interior designs, “in particular commencement with soft furnishings”.

An official who attended the meeting asked that cellphones not be allowed in future meetings.

Seventeen days later, on October 10 2010, Public Works reported on the progress of the upgrades. 

Work was still outstanding on fencing, the helipad, the building of a guardhouse, the relocation of two families, and the construction of tunnels and safe havens.

At the end of that month, Zuma fired Doidge and appointed Mahlangu-Nkabinde in his place.

On November 5 2010, four days after being appointed Public Works minister, Mahlangu-Nkabinde wrote to Zuma, saying it was “prudent” of her to update him on the project.

“The fast-track nature of the project necessitates the daily updating of the project plan and for alternate planning methodologies to be employed in order to meet the target date of November 30 2010,” Mahlangu-Nkabinde wrote.

She proceeded to list all the ­outstanding projects to Zuma, ­including a cattle culvert, tuck shop, the relocation of families, a helipad, tunnels and safe havens.

This draws into question Zuma’s attempts in Parliament last week to draw a distinction between his personal expenditure and that of Public Works.

Zuma referred to “security ­enhancements” paid for by the state and that it was a separate project driven by Public Works.

But Mahlangu-Nkabinde’s letter makes it clear that Zuma was fully aware of the fact that apart from “security measurements”, the state was also paying for other things at his compound.

The tone of her letters is also one of reporting back to Zuma.

She wrote: “Taking the above ­into consideration, I am pleased to report that all the work for which my department is responsible will be completed by the deadline of November 30 2010 as per the ­commitment given to you by my predecessor (Doidge).”

Attached to her letter was a progress report outlining all the Nkandla developments and the percentages completed.

Public Works’ acting director-general, Mandisa Fatyela-Lindie, said it was premature to respond on specific aspects of the project.

Her department is currently ­investigating the costs incurred and the integrity of the procurement process. 

Other Nkandlagate investigations are being conducted by the Public Protector and Auditor­General.

“This is the first time that our ­department has implemented this kind of initiative on a prestige project. We want the team to do a thorough investigation ...The ­department, together with the ­relevant government agencies, will study the findings and take whatever appropriate actions to deal with any wrongdoers.”

She said the findings should be available within the next two to three weeks.

- City Press

Nkandla: What's in the name of a country estate?

Nkandla isn't the only Zuma family homestead. We round up some of the others and explain their surprising - and rather aggressive - names.

Visiting the homes of the Zuma family, the metaphorical aspects of the isiZululanguage that the president holds so dear are evident in their names.

A few hundred metres from KwaDakwadunuse – better known as Nkandla, the collection of squat, cream-coloured rondavels clucking around the much larger patriarchal edifice of Zuma's main house that has been in the news for apparent security upgrades totalling R248-million – is another collection of more modern buildings called Mpindamshaye, according to locals.

Mpindamshaye means "I will beat you up again" in isiZulu and appears to be the second "family" homestead, referred to by the president in Parliament last week.

This is where upgrades by the "extended family" were done first and when that "had reached the finishing-touches stage, we started with the one where I stay [KwaDakwadunuse]", said Zuma last Thursday in Cape Town.

"The other one does not appear on television because there are no security features on it," the president told Parliament in his oral reply to a question by the Democratic Alliance's Lindiwe Mazibuko. "That is where, in fact, we started upgrading. We started at our residence called Mpindamshaye."

Zuma said his extended family had "a manner of working together".

A collection of light-grey buildings with a more modern feel, it is, according to locals, used by the president's younger brother, Joseph, and his gargantuan nephew, Khulubuse.

The locals were unable to comment on whether the behaviour of the inhabitants – "Khula", especially, with his unpaid Aurora miners on starvation row – had contributed to the name.

KwaDakwadunuse means "when you are drunk you are misbehaving", a bugbear, perhaps, for a teetotal president with a deeply social conservative streak and a penchant for chastising people for being "culturally" and personally disrespectful.

Another Zuma home, according to a 2009 news report, is called KwaThembitshe, which means "while a stone remains unchanged, a person will surprise you". This is something Zuma has managed for most his life, whether as an underground activist or as head of the "stone that grinds" (Mbokhodo, the ANC's internal intelligence arm), or as president of South Africa.

- M&G

Cape shack fires leave 300 homeless

About 300 people have been left homeless after their shacks caught fire in areas across the Western Cape on Saturday, the City's disaster risk management centre said.

Spokesman Wilfred Solomons-Johannes said fires at Seawinds, Athlone and Langa and Phillipi destroyed shacks and interrupted power supply on Saturday morning.

No injuries were reported.

The cause of the fires was not immediately known, but authorities were investigating, said Solomons-Johannes. - Sapa

UK gives £19 million aid to South Africa - its president spends £17.5million on his palace

It is a nation racked by poverty, where 13 million people survive on less than £1 a day, and two million have no access to a toilet. 

Yet as his people struggle in squalor, South African president Jacob Zuma has sparked outrage by spending £17.5 million to upgrade his rural family home.

Lavish works – which include the construction of 31 new houses, an underground bunker accessed by lifts and a helipad – will cost almost as much as the £19 million British taxpayers send to South Africa in annual aid.

The costly upgrade to Zuma’s once-humble home in the village of Nkandla includes Astroturf sports fields and tennis courts, a gymnasium and state-of-the art security systems, including fingerprint-controlled access pads.

And nearby roads have benefited from a further £40 million of improvements.

When African journalists revealed the astronomical cost of the work, Zuma’s ministers turned on the whistle-blowers, saying that revealing the details of ‘top secret’ documents was illegal.

Originally the cost of the project, which began two years ago, was put at £500,000 – but it has since skyrocketed. South African taxpayers are footing most of the bill, although Zuma, a polygamist with four wives and at least 20 children, is said to be contributing £700,000 of his own money – a stretch on his annual £185,000 salary.

However, he also receives a controversial £1.2million in ‘spousal support’ for his wives – despite recently calling on fellow politicians to tighten their belts – and pays only a peppercorn rent of £560 on the tribally owned plot in the Zululand hills where his mansion sits.

Zuma has named his residence a ‘national key point’ – a status invented by the previous paranoid apartheid government – which means it is entitled to security measures ‘in the interests of the nation’.

Last week he was grilled in parliament about what he and his family were costing the nation, and struggled to answer, protesting that he was unaware of the scale of the work.

‘All the buildings and every room we use in that residence were built by ourselves as family and not by the government,’ he protested. He did not know the amount spent on bunkers, claiming: ‘I don’t know the figures; that’s not my job.’

Under pressure, Zuma has been forced to agree to two investigations: one to probe the spiralling costs at Nkandla, the other to see if there was a breach of parliamentary spending rules.

‘Nkandlagate’ – as the state-owned media have been banned from calling it – is just the latest scandal to engulf the 70-year-old African National Congress leader. In 2004 he faced trial with his financial adviser Schabir Shaik over racketeering and corruption claims for accepting tens of thousands of pounds in bribes from European arms firms. 

Shaik was imprisoned for 15 years, but Zuma’s case was ‘discontinued’ after complicated legal wrangling – even though a judge said there was ‘overwhelming’ evidence of a corrupt relationship between the two men.The following year, a 31-year-old HIV-positive woman accused him of rape. Although he was acquitted, Zuma’s ludicrous claim that he took a shower after sex to prevent contracting HIV made him a laughing stock.

His personal life also came under scrutiny following the 2000 suicide of his first wife, who left a note describing ‘24 years of hell’ with him, and again after the illegitimate birth of another child in 2009. He accused the media of invading his privacy when revealing the scandal.

Meanwhile, South Africa is in an increasingly parlous state, having had its credit rating downgraded following industrial unrest. Workers at the Marikana platinum mine were mown down and killed by armed police last month when they dared to demand better pay. A truck-drivers’ strike later led to more deaths, and last week thousands of farmworkers downed tools in protest at their £4.85 day-rate.

Yet Zuma – who glories in his nickname ‘100 per cent Zulu boy’ – still has substantial support among the people, bolstered by his freedom-fighter credentials, having spent ten years imprisoned on Robben Island alongside Nelson Mandela.

Britain is committed to spending an average of £19 million a year in aid on South Africa until 2015, mainly aimed at reducing HIV. But the Department for International Development is examining how it spends the UK’s aid budget, and recently announced plans to slash the controversial £280 million a year it sends to India.

- dailymail

Nkandla: Profligate and presidential

The country's most extravagant presidency has overseen millions spent on an estate without a formal lease.

President Jacob Zuma pays R8 000 a year to lease the ground on which his Nkandla compound stands, although total spending on the site over the past decade is about R250-million.

This is one of the few known figures and facts in the ongoing saga of the president's private residence; virtually everything else has been denied, disclaimed or obfuscated – or drawn from documents that government departments will not confirm as accurate, or which they simply deny exist.

The trial of Schabir Shaik, which found that he had had a corrupt relationship with Zuma, and documents presented as evidence in the case showed that Zuma had a bond worth R900 000 by 2002, which partly financed the first stage of construction on the sprawling complex. Some of that may still be outstanding.

But the presidency this week refused to release any details on the loan, even as First National Bank (FNB), speaking in general terms, said it could not have granted a traditional bond on the property, because it is held in trust on behalf of the Zulu people.

The circumstances under which the bank granted the loan are not known, although Zuma confidant and spokesperson Mac Maharaj was, at the time, a director of the holding company of FNB. Neither Maharaj nor the bank have responded to questions on the matter.

Financial trouble

The source of the remainder of the money necessary for the construction is not known. Zuma had no hard cash, little in the way of assets and no major source of income at the time. Family financial trouble would seem to indicate no major improvement in those circumstances. A combination of building estimates based on photographs of the site, Zuma's statement to Parliament that his family was responsible for the entire cost of the core of the compound and documents from the department of public works obtained by City Press leave at least R9-million not accounted for.

It is not known who signed off on the vast amount of government spending on the site – and how that individual or group managed to do so without making Zuma aware of the amounts involved, even though it was intimately intertwined with building work he was personally overseeing. Zuma has said in statements and in Parliament that he does not know the amounts involved.

It is also not known when the decision was made to declare the entire site a national key point, what triggered that decision or whether it was properly executed. The presidency, police and defence department have refused to disclose this information and others, including the department of public works, have claimed they do not have access to it.

What is known is that Zuma's bill for the use of the land is about R667 a month, according to the land owner. "The cost of the lease is related to tariffs as determined by the board from time to time, taking into account the land use, extent and location," said the Ingonyama Trust, the body that administers tribal land in KwaZulu-Natal, in a written response to questions about the lease. "At the time the maximum tariff was 20c per square metre. We applied the normal sliding scale for undeveloped rural residential land and the rental thus determined is R8 000 per annum."

Millions spent with no lease

Answers from the board of the trust have also revealed that the public works department started work on the construction that would eventually include helipads and a bunker shortly after Zuma became president – but without basic documents relating to the land. By his account Zuma, too, would have spent millions in building and upgrades, some of it funded with a bank loan, without formalising his lease.

"The application date for this site [the Zuma residences, which consist of several buildings] was September 2010 and the department of public works lodged its application for the land abutting the presidential complex [in] January 2011," the Ingonyama board said. "It was under this separate lease that the state has erected facilities."

Plans for the security facilities were already in place when the Mail & Guardian broke the news of the Nkandla upgrades in December 2009.

The Ingonyama statement supports Zuma's explanation to Parliament, which suggested that the security section of the complex (including housing for police and soldiers) could be separated from his family's spending on buildings for their private use.

But it raises additional questions about the conduct of public works, which now appears to have decided to spend what would amount to 2500 times the limit imposed for ministers on the private residence of the president without so much as securing the use of the land in writing first.

Although Ingonyama said that ­formal leases were not required for traditional authorities to assign land-use rights, regulation and laws on government spending do require them.

An expensive president

The willingness of a branch of government to forgo such details and what appears to have been a remarkable lack of questioning of the spending in Nkandla is part of a broader pattern that has emerged under Zuma's administration.

The Zuma presidency is the most expensive South Africa has experienced – and not only in terms of overall expenditure under his watch. Zuma has a big personal footprint in many regards. His large family incurs extra cost for the state in travel, support services and in terms of the Nkandla compound. Zuma's own travel resulted in the use of "shadow aeroplanes" that were  chartered for intercontinental flights without passengers.

Less direct costs have included his creation of six new ministries and the appointment of new deputy ­ministers with their associated administrative and salary expenses.

However, it is in the voluntary spending by government departments in projects to the benefit of, or close to Zuma's heart that the pattern becomes most pronounced: the department of public works on the Nkandla project; the department of rural development in planning the new town of "Zumaville" just 3km from the homestead; and the department of agriculture's support of Masibambisane, Zuma's rural development initiative that has a strong focus on the Nkandla area.

The ministers of all three departments have said they were not acting under orders. Their combined spending – including numbers the agriculture ministry denies – totals more than R2-billion.

- M&G