The fourth accused, Allan Robert Abbu, the former deputy head of the Durban Solid Waste (DSW) Unit, was aware that the waste collection tender evaluation process was advanced, according to a State witness who testified before the Durban High Court on Tuesday.
Nevertheless, he halted the process, claiming to have a plan, and DSW hired seasoned contractors to collect waste.
Abbu is accused, alongside the former mayor of eThekwini, Zandile Gumede, and 20 others, of numerous charges, including money laundering, racketeering, fraud, corruption, and contravention of the Municipal Finance Management Act and the Municipal Systems Act, relating to the R320 million DSW tender.
The new witness, who cannot be named, started giving her evidence in chief on Monday.
She testified that her role in the eThekwini Municipality involved facilitating and coordinating unit score, providing admin support to the whole unit, providing an oversight role to the contract management section, preparing bid reports to different committees, attending committee meetings, and providing admin support to the whole unit, among others.
So far, the court has learned that the DSW Unit had issued an open tender for waste collection in November 2017, and the closing date was December 13, 2017.
However, the unit stated that it received numerous applications and would not be able to complete the tender process.
As a result, they approached the Bid Adjudication Committee (BAC) to seek authority to invite quotations from experienced service providers to collect waste.
The unit said this was an emergency as contracts of individuals collecting waste at that time were set to expire on December 31, 2017. The unit said it was imperative to hire experienced service providers.
On December 19, 2017, the BAC approved the quotations of the service providers who are also accused in this matter. When DSW was motivating for this, it said there were in-house refuse collection services. However, the unit said there was intimidation of staff collecting waste, stoning, and torching of municipal vehicles.
However, the State witness informed the court that the capturing of the bidders began on December 13.. She said she had asked for additional staff members from two units to speed up the process and evaluation, tax compliance, and tender amount for each response by December 15. However, she said it had not been finalised.
Counsel appointed by the National Prosecuting Authority, advocate Viwe Notshe SC, asked the witness what would happen after the evaluation was done.
“After evaluation was completed, the bid adjudication report was going to the BAC,” the witness responded.
“Was Abbu informed of the process?” Notshe asked.
The witness said yes and added that the process was at an advanced stage.
Asked by Judge Sharmaine Balton what an advanced stage is, she said the majority of the work had been done.
“The only thing left was to combine the report and take it to BAC,” she said.
She also added that Abbu was aware of this.
The matter was adjourned early for Wednesday so that the State can obtain some audit reports from the municipality.
nomonde.zondi@inl.co.za
