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CIVIL SERVANTS FIRED FOR E1M ELECTRICITY UNITS SCANDAL!

14/07/2019 07:22:00 Phila Sibiya

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MBABANE – No wonder government is so broke; even cleaners are helping themselves to money that belongs to the state.

Greed and selfishness has exposed a corrupt alliance between a cleaner and two assistant accountants who were at the centre of a covert operation of diverting prepaid electricity units meant for civil servants houses and selling same for their own benefit.

The three government employees were based under the Ministry of Public Works and Transport and they have since been fired by the Civil Service Commission (CSC).

The Times SUNDAY understands that this operation has been traced as far back as 2014 and calculations, so far, indicate that government was defrauded electricity units worth E1 million and the figure could rise.

Principal Secretary (PS) Makhosini Mndawe said even though he may not be privy of the current estimates, ‘initially, when the charges were laid, the total cost was in the region of E300 000, but as investigations continued the figures escalated’.
It is said that evidence given by witnesses before the CSC was that the electricity units were sold at a minimum 50 per cent discount hence there was a mad rush from clients to purchase them every month.

CSC Acting Executive Secretary Amos Ngwenya confirmed knowledge of the trio’s matter. “I know the matter involving these officers. We dealt with it after it was brought to us by the principal secretary in the Ministry of Public Works and Transport,” he said. He added that the three were no longer employed under the ministry.

investigations still continuing
Although the trio has been dismissed from the civil service, investigations are still continuing because more government employees, mostly under the Ministry of public works and transport, are suspected to have been involved in the scheme.

It does not end there as, according to impeccable sources within government, the long arm of the law is most likely to extend to the private sector where lawyers and employees of an esteemed financial institution are said to have benefitted from the operation.
The dismissed employees, as confirmed by PS Mndawe, have been identified as Lindiwe Nkonyane (Assistant Accountant), Cebisile Shongwe (Assistant Account) and Bahlengile Dlamini (Cleaner).

The PS said the three ‘have been dismissed from the employ of the Public Service by the Civil Service Commission, following charges of misconduct in that they deceitfully used government funds to purchase prepaid electricity units and sold same for personal gain”.

Shongwe and Dlamini were reportedly dismissed last month while Nkonyane was fired earlier. Each of the three was said to have a list of her own clients to whose meter numbers the prepaid electricity units were sent to straight from the Eswatini Electricity Company (EEC) after Nkonyane had submitted a cheque and voucher from the Treasury Department.

share the proceeds

“After getting paid by their clients, the three would then share the proceeds according to the number of clients that each one had on the list,” said one of the impeccable sources.

However, the highly-placed sources said the operation went bust after the cleaner felt she was being given a raw deal as the electricity units were no longer being sold to her clients, and therefore she was not eligible for the dividends anymore.

“Apparently, Lindiwe got new clients and what then happened was that Bahlengile was no longer having her customers serviced by Lindiwe as the latter now had a long list of new clients. This did not go down well with Bahlengile,” said one of the sources.
As a result, the cleaner is said to have gone to the police and blew the whistle on Lindiwe.

“She told the police that Lindiwe was taking government money and buying electricity for her friends and family. The police immediately launched an investigation and went to EEC to find out the meter numbers for whom the electricity units were being bought with government money. To their surprise, they found that Bahlengile’s meter number was among those that were receiving the electricity,” related another impeccable source.

dealing with the matter

Chief Police Information and Communications Officer Superintendent Phindile Vilakati said they were currently dealing with the matter where the PS was the complainant and the cleaner was one of the suspects.

The cops are reported to have then brought all the evidence to the ministry and an intense investigation began wherein it was found that more people were involved.

“There are many government employees who will be fired. Others within the ministry were found to have been benefitting from this scheme and they are still to be brought before disciplinary hearings where they are expected to detail their involvement,” one of the sources said.
Mndawe, the PS, said he was not in a position to confirm the truthfulness of other employees being taken through disciplinary hearings except to state that ‘internal investigations are still ongoing’.

CSC’s Ngwenya said also did not know about the other government employees who are reportedly to be brought in for disciplinary purposes because the commission was not involved in investigations processes.

EEC EMPLOYEE INVOLVED?
The investigations are said to have uncovered that an employee of EEC was involved in the scheme and it was found that she was a close associate with one of the three. “She knew what was going on and she resigned when EEC also began investigating. EEC simply printed the list of all the meter numbers that were being bought electricity using government money,” said the sources.

Khaya Mavuso, EEC’s Head of Corporate Communications, when contacted, said all issues of employee disciplinary action remained strictly confidential and could not be discussed with third parties.
“Therefore, we are unable to discuss them or give comment. As a company, we also request that you respect the internal processes that are being followed to address this matter,’ he said.
Nonetheless, a highly-placed source within EEC said this was a one-of-a-kind incident and had not been witnessed before because the company has procedures that are strict to avoid employees stealing money from it. The source said even in this case, the employee did not steal any money but she and her accomplices were diverting the units to their own people.
“EEC was not losing any money. Internally, the company is assisting the police with this issue to make sure that it does not happen again. The implicated employee resigned in the midst of the investigations after she saw that there was no other way out. The processes have still not been completed,” stated the source.
Nanikie Mnisi, the Under Secretary in the ministry, is said to have been outwitted by Nkonyane because she would sign for the purchasing of the electricity units but never knew that they never reached their intended destination.
Explaining the process, the sources said when buying electricity for government, the accountant has to take a cheque to EEC that is from Government Treasury and there is a voucher number that is linked to all the meter numbers for whom the electricity units are being purchased.
“It is the accountant who is responsible for distributing the electricity units to the depots and offices. The accountant would then divert the money for the depots’ electricity and purchase electricity units for her ‘customers’. This would happen every month,” said the sources.

vouchers to purchase units
They further related: “The under secretary would sign government vouchers to purchase the electricity units but we would then see newspaper reports saying there was no electricity at the depots and workers were cooking using firewood. Lindiwe would be asked about this and she would say government had no money so electricity units were bought only for the offices and not depots. What was strange though was that the Mbabane and Manzini depots always had electricity and she had no responses when asked why this was happening.”
It is said that when the US would visit the depots, as she usually has to look at the welfare of the employees, she would get complaints regarding the electricity and that the employees were using their own money to buy it.
This was reportedly even causing fights among the employees because there is an extra charge they had to incur when purchasing electricity for government use. “It was found that one senior officer was protecting Lindiwe as he knew what was going on. When he was first approached, he said there was no evidence that Lindiwe was illegally selling electricity units meant for government and that it was all hearsay,” stated the sources.