Social Development Deputy Minister Henrietta Bogopane-Zulu is entangled in yet another Nkandla row: this time over a hefty bill in legal advice.
The Sunday Independent can reveal that a fight has ensued over who is liable for the R179 000 legal costs that Bogopane-Zulu racked up earlier this year when she responded to questions by Public Protector Thuli Madonsela. The bickering has resulted in a bitter fallout between Bogopane-Zulu and the Department of Women’s director-general, Veliswa Baduza.
The wrangling is revealed in several catty e-mails between the two. At the time Bogopane-Zulu was deputy minister of women, children and people with disabilities. Former minister Lulu Xingwana has also been drawn into the fray – having sought legal opinion on why the department should not foot the bill.
In several official documents seen by The Sunday Independent, Bogopane-Zulu maintains that the director-general in the Office of the Presidency, Cassius Lubisi, gave her the go-ahead to make representations on her official duties in the Nkandla project.
Bogopane-Zulu – who played a part in the Nkandla project during her two-year stint as public works deputy minister – stated that the permission was granted after the state law adviser and Baduza failed to respond to her request.
But Lubisi denied that the Presidency was liable for settling Bogopane-Zulu’s legal bill. He said the Public Finance Management Act made it clear that any department had an accounting officer, who was the director-general, tasked with managing the funds.
“There is no way that an accounting officer of the Presidency will be accountable to an accounting officer of another department,” Lubisi said.
“We have absolutely nothing to do with the finance of another department. The person to ask is the accounting officer of that department, who is the director-general, Baduza.”
Contacted for comment, Baduza said she was going into a meeting and would comment later. She had not responded by the time of publication. Bogopane-Zulu could also not be reached for comment.
The bickering is also laid bare in Baduza’s e-mail to Xingwana’s special adviser, Mitaketo Joyce Maluleke.
Maluleke said in her e-mail that Baduza had a meeting with Xingwana, at the Protea Hotel in Centurion, at which she said she would not pay for the legal fees as Bogopane-Zulu had “not followed procurement procedures”.
She suggested that Bogopane-Zulu had asked Baduza for permission to seek legal action.
But in an e-mail to Bogopane-Zulu, Baduza disputes this. She says Bogopane-Zulu only “informed her that she had done so”.
Baduza describes Maluleke’s e-mail as “not only an attack on my being, but also my integrity as an accounting officer”.
“I refute with the contempt it deserves the allegation that I am blaming Minister Xingwana and you on this matter – I do not know where you got that allegation and would like to tell you that your source of it is completely distorted,” Baduza states.
The disclosure of the bill and the wrangling comes just months after Bogopane-Zulu was implicated in the interministerial task team’s report on Nkandla, released by Public Works Minister Thulas Nxesi in December.
In the report, Nxesi fingered Bogopane-Zulu and then-public works minister Geoff Doidge for alleged political interference in the R246 million security upgrades at President Jacob Zuma’s Nkandla private home. Doidge has since taken up the ambassador’s post in Sri Lanka.
In a detailed letter to Women’s Minister Susan Shabangu requesting that the department pay for the bill, Bogopane-Zulu says she received a letter from Madonsela on January 14, giving her six days to respond. She could not meet the deadline because she was admitted to hospital. After receiving a request from Bogopane-Zulu’s office, Madonsela granted an extension.
Bogopane-Zulu states that she forwarded the message to Baduza, requesting her “to engage with Lubisi further on the matter and revert to her on the process going forward”.
Two days before her deadline for submitting her representation to Madonsela, Bogopane-Zulu had not received a reply from Baduza or the state law adviser, according to her letter to Shabangu. She then took a decision to brief her own legal team.
After the submission, the bill was sent to Baduza to process. But Baduza refused, saying that Xingwana should approve the payment.
But in her letter to Shabangu, Bogopane-Zulu states: “I believe that the accounting officer is to make a determination in this regards (sic) and not the executive authority, however, I stand to be corrected in this regards (sic).”
In August, Shabangu responded to Bogopane-Zulu, distancing herself from the matter, and advising that she claim a refund from public works.
- Sunday Independent
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