- In October, the SIU was granted an order to freeze the pension benefits of a former senior Limpopo health department official.
- Thokozani Florence Mhlongo resigned in the face of disciplinary action over dodgy Covid-19 contracts.
- She approached the Special Tribunal to reconsider its decision, but the tribunal denied her application.
Special Tribunal has dismissed an application by a former Limpopo health department boss to reconsider an order allowing the Special Investigating Unit (SIU) to freeze her pension benefits.
The SIU welcomed the tribunal's order on Thursday.
In October, the tribunal granted a preservation order to the SIU to freeze Thokozani Florence Mhlongo's pension benefits.
The order interdicts the Government Employees Pension Fund from paying out or transferring any benefits due to Mhlongo while civil proceedings are under way to recover losses suffered by the department because of dodgy Covid-19 tenders.
Mhlongo was the head of department at the Limpopo health department at the time the contracts were concluded. She resigned after the department instituted a disciplinary hearing against her.
SIU spokesperson Kaizer Kganyago said the SIU applied for preservation orders early in its investigations after uncovering prima facie evidence against officials.
"This makes it easier for the SIU to recover financial losses suffered by the state when the need arises," Kganyago said.
"The SIU approached the Special Tribunal to freeze [the] pension benefits of Dr Mhlongo after she resigned with immediate effect in June 2022, in the face of a disciplinary hearing, which emanated from SIU investigations in the affairs of the department relating to the procurement of personal protective equipment (PPE) in response to the Covid-19 pandemic.
He said:
"Furthermore, the SIU investigation revealed that Dr Mhlongo, as the accounting officer, allegedly exposed the department to wasteful expenditure when she authorised the procurement and payment of 10 000 cellphones to the value of R10 million for Covid-19 household screening.
"The department could only manage to distribute 388 of the 10 000 cellphones between September 2020 and March 2021, and the cellphones were distributed without the required screening application, SIU investigations revealed. After the physical counting of cellphones in storage by SIU investigators in March 2021, the department distributed 9588 cellphones to community health workers for Covid-19 vaccination without the required application installed."