The Public Protector Adv Thuli Madonsela told the Bapo Ba Mogale community that over R680m has been misspent through the controversial D-Account in North West. Madonsela addressed the community, releasing her preliminary report on the missing millions of Bapo mining royalties. She assured the citizens that a full report will be released soon. “Through the investigations we have found that R681m was paid into the community account from 1994-2016,” Madonsela said. Madonsela said currently there is just R495 000. She said when they started to get involved, about R50m was already spent. “A Chunk of money also spent on bursaries. We will investigate who received those bursaries,” Madonsela said. According to the Public Protector, the original budget for King Edward Mogale palace was R20m, in the end R80m was spent . The Public Protector has told the King they need to repay the money. “The forensic investigation revealed the biggest share of the money came from the mining firm Lonmin towards the community account,” Madonsela said. She said they also established that a lot of money was spent on consultants, groceries, tribal Councillors and catering. The Public Protector was in 2012 asked by the community to investigate allegations of systematic looting of the collective resources of the community, including funds in the so called D-Account. Mining companies deposit royalties into the account for community development. Madonsela told the Chief of Bapo that her team has established what the funds on the account have been spent on, they just need to establish if the expenditure was proper. She said she will further investigate if mining companies have been paying community enough for their resources. Since 1994 only R392 million has been paid. Madonsela also met with the Lonmin management over the royalties to the community of Bapong. She said King Edward Mogale asked them to investigate how much was in the account since the dawn of democracy and how it was spent. “You have asked us whether all of the payments due to Bapo from Lonmin and others was paid, at the bank there is only one account which makes it easier to audit it,” she said She further said through the investigations they established that the signatory was Mr Manye from 2006-2011. “We have somebody who started signing from 2011 to date, a certain Mogotsi,” she said. Madonsela said they will be talking to them regarding the money and how it was spent as they are both still in the office. She met with the Director-General Dr. Lydia Sebego and MEC of Ontlametse Mochware on Tuesday with an effort to finalise the investigation before she leaves office in October. She said they have been battling to get information from the office of the Premier as well as Department of Traditional affairs until they met with them recently. Madonsela assured the community that the asset forfeiture unit will be used to assist with getting back what was stolen. Source: http://www.thenewage.co.za
