Modubule threatens PS with perjury
Gothataone Moeng | Wednesday May 21, 2014 11:31
In a stern warning, PAC chair Nehemiah Modubule said he would hate to see the befuddled Madikwe, the acting Permanent Secretary in the Office of the President (OP), become the first accounting officer to be charged with perjury for the glaring inconsistencies in his accounting before the committee.
In his account, Madikwe reported plans to have advertising debts of P4,429,925.87, owed to state broadcasters Botswana Television (BTV) and Radio Botswana 2, abandoned as his ministry cannot get the debtors to pay up. Madikwe said the files containing contracts with the debtors were destroyed by water while stored in a basement at the Mass Media Complex.
Yesterday, Madikwe revealed that his ministry had sought legal advice from the Attorney General as the Ministry of Finance and Development Planning (MFDP) had rejected their application for abandonment of the debt, accusing the OP of negligence of the files.
Madikwe disputed the negligence charge saying that the water that got into the files was from a mechanical fault that happened without detection, and that there was therefore no chance of moving the files. He further said that the AG agreed there was no proof of negligence.
“Finance says there was negligence, while the AG says there is no evidence of negligence,” Madikwe told the committee yesterday. A representative of the AGs told the committee that although the letter from MFDP pointed towards negligence, it did not establish who had been negligent, whereas a negligence charge requires the establishment of a person who has been negligent and how they have been negligent. The committee recommended that Madikwe should therefore get back to MFDP to prove that they were not negligent.
Madikwe was also rapped over the knuckles for his decision to move P14,174.25 that he had budgeted for donation to the Presidential Housing Appeal to a special project. Madikwe yesterday said he moved the money towards a community centre in Kalkfontein, an admission that earned him a reprimand from Modubule.
“Accounting officer, our resolutions are binding. You had resolved that the money would be taken to the Housing Appeal, but now you have changed and are saying the money is gone to Kalkfontein.
We have never charged anyone with perjury, but with your inconsistencies, you will land yourself in trouble,” Modubule warned. Committee member Phillip Makgalemele went further and accused Madikwe of manipulating figures.
Madikwe also got into trouble for P7,227.14 that his ministry had, in the last PAC seating, owed the ministry due to private phone calls by officers in the ministry.
Yesterday, the acting PS had changed his tune, saying the phone calls concerned official business, and that the ministry had thus applied to the MFDP to abandon the debt.
“Last year, under oath, the Accounting Officer said the calls were private. Now in 2014, he says the calls are official, what happened,” committee member Samson Moyo Guma asked. The committee resolved to recommend to the finance ministry not to approve the application to abandon the debt.