The number of households documented in the 2017 R320 million Durban Solid Waste (DSW) invite for tender quotations, came under the spotlight again on Thursday at the Durban High Court, as the defence revealed that their clients did not get the same figures as those reflected on the eThekwini Municipality’s audit report.

Twenty two people are on trial for the fraud and corruption related to the tender, including former eThekwini Municipality mayor Zandile Gumede and City Manager Sipho Nzuza. 

During cross-examination, Advocate Willie Lombard, representing uZuzinekele Trading 31 CC took a State witness through the figures on the number of households in an audit report and a tender quotation. uZuzinekele is one of the service providers who was approached to bid for the DSW tender in 2017. 

The state alleges that the household numbers were inflated to accommodate the bidding but Lombard said his client ended servicing more households than was contained in the tender.

Lombard and the State witness, who cannot be named, did calculations, and it emerged that the household numbers that uZuzinekele Trading was asked to provide a quotation for on the waste collection tender was less than the figure provided in the audit report.  The tender quotation household figures were 94,889. 

The audit report had 101,852 household numbers for areas that included uMlazi. UZuzinekele is said to have serviced the areas. 

Both Lombard and the witness agreed, based on their calculations, that 6,963 households were not included in the DSW invite tender quotation. 

“Logic tells me that the service provider provided services to 6,963 households that are not on (the) documentation (tender quote)?” Lombard asked. 

The witness agreed. 

Evidence led by the State was that the number of households that needed waste refuse collection services during this period was inflated and doubled to approximately 90,000 as stated in the invitation to tender quotation.

The court has also learned through the witness that the number of households used in tender invites came from quarterly audit reports. 

The audit report is compiled using municipal data, reflecting the number of households and areas serviced for waste collection. When the witness was leading her evidence, she told the court that she did not know where the figure of 90,000 came from. 

Advocate Donovan Moodley, representing EL Shaddai Holdings Group CC, referred the witness to her previous evidence where she said that field inspectors go out to count households. The witness had also said that field inspectors record their data on a field sheet. Field sheets are among the data that auditors use to compile an audit report. 

“Under no circumstances would the service provider be able to update these numbers?”

The witness said, “That’s correct.” 

The trial continues. 

nomonde.zondi@inl.co.za

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