The legal team of former eThekwini mayor Zandile Gumede has argued in the Durban High Court, that the external investigation into the allegedly fraudulent Durban Solid Waste tender, was unlawful.
Gumede and 21 co-accused are facing over 2 000 charges, including racketeering and corruption, related to the awarding of the tender in 2017.
Among the accused are city officials, councillors, businesspeople and other entities.
Gumede’s lawyer Advocate Jay Naidoo continued to probe the head of the eThekwini Municipality’s Integrity Investigating Unit, Mbuso Ngcobo, around the details of a forensic investigation into the allegedly fraudulent tender.
An external company, Integrity Forensic Solutions (IFS), was appointed by the municipality to do this.
Naidoo questioned Ngcobo on why IFS, who had outstanding investigations, was awarded the tender, ahead of 16 other contenders.
Naidoo questions Ngcobo, “You are the head, you would sign off on the engagement of IFS, engaging outside contract, that is correct. The engagement of the outsourced entity cannot go through without your signature and your approval, you must have signed off on the appointments in respect of IFS’s other three assignments, you must have known that at the time of this investigation is being allocated they already had three others.”
Judge Sharmaine Balton also sought clarity from Ngcobo on details surrounding the appointment of IFS.
“At the time when you signed off appointing them to this investigation, you had already signed off for appointing them to the other three investigations? Yes, My Lady, for the other engagements which are reflected on the register, I would have signed the engagement letter before they commenced the work. My Lady, as you can see, the case register is a very huge document. There are a number of companies which were appointed prior to this investigation. In fact, it is not only IFS which had four or more than four allocations.”
Legal analyst, Melusi Xulu says the defense is simply challenging the testimony of the State’s first witness.
Xulu says it is still early to cast doubt on the state’s case.
“The purpose of cross examination for defense is to show that there must be doubt that must be cast on the testimony of the first state witness, which they must cross examine to such an extent that whatever comes out of cross examination will be in the favour of their clients. It worked well for the defense that they must show that his testimony cannot be trusted. We can’t look at the evidence in piece meal, we have to look at it holistically. One part might not be good for the state, but we do not know what they might bring later. We have to wait until the whole evidence is shown. That is why I keep saying this is a marathon.”
The trial continues.
Corruption trial of Zandile Gumede and 21 others for multi-million rand tender:
