The Gauteng government has fired five of the nine senior managers from the Gauteng Departments of Health and Infrastructure Development who were implicated in the Anglo Ashanti Hospital corruption.

In a statement issued on Tuesday, the office of the Gauteng premier says five were dismissed, two received written warnings, one was acquitted, and the other could not be subjected to disciplinary action because he was no longer employed by the department.

This comes after the Special Investigation Unit (SIU) report which recommended that disciplinary and criminal actions be considered against the implicated managers. 

In December 2022 Gauteng Premier Panyaza Lesufi reported that the SIU had uncovered serious irregularities in the awarding of contractors for the refurbishment of the AngloGold Ashanti Hospital which was supposed to have 180 ICU beds for COVID-19 critical care.

At the time Lesufi said:  “The investigation revealed that the officials misled the Department of Health by indicating that only minor refurbishment needed to be implemented which led to an initial budget of about R50 million which ultimately skyrocketed to about R588 million.” 

The hospital in Carletonville on the West Rand was previously owned by AngloGold Ashanti mine and was donated to the Gauteng government in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. 

Lesufi says after thoroughly reviewing the evidence, including interviews and forensic analysis, the officials were charged with various offences including misconduct, fraud, and corruption.

“We believe that this will put this regrettable episode to bed. We will allow for other applicable processes to unfold. We remain committed to ensuring a transparent and clean government that is prudent in handling resources entrusted to it,” Lesufi says. 

Criminal charges should be instituted

Gauteng DA’s health spokesperson Jack Bloom welcomed the conclusion of the disciplinary hearings against the nine officials even though it dragged on for a long time. 

“Unfortunately the disciplinary case took three years to conclude, costing the provincial health department R17 million for salaries of the suspended officials,” he says. “Criminal charges should be laid against the implicated officials as well as the companies that benefited from the irregular contracts.”

In December Bloom said Gauteng Health MEC Nomantu Nkomo-Ralehoko revealed in a reply to the legislature that her department had spent R16.7 million on 10 officials suspended with pay, in three cases for more than two-and-a-half years.

Bloom says he suspects that the disciplinary process was deliberately delayed to protect certain people. 

“There should also be political accountability for the extremely poor decision to refurbish this hospital which was not even owned by the provincial government. It was supposed to be used for COVID-19 patients in 2020 but only a hundred patients were treated there. The hospital is now abandoned and vandalised,” he says. – Health-e News