Mogoditshane civic official denies theft
Tsaone Basimanebotlhe | Friday May 29, 2020 18:57
The value of the already awarded tender was publicised during the Minister of Youth Empowerment, Sport and Culture Development Tumiso Rakgare’s tour of the school in his capacity as the area’s Member of Parliament (MP).
Katjinojiwa has now come out to say that the P1m cost “is not true” and told Mmegi that the allegation has tarnished the image of the council.
“I do not understand why the minister of sport, who is also the area MP, did not invite us or come to our office to get the right information.
If he has a complaint regarding the tender, he could have spoken to us or asked our ministry. We do not have anything to hide as a council.
That cubicle has 10 toilets and the tender had a big septic tank that needed to be built,” Katjinojiwa said on Wednesday.
He said the preliminaries for the project cost P45,000.
The preliminaries are site establishment costs, which involve costs for water and power supply safety amongst others as the contractor is not supposed to use government utilities.
Katjinojiwa said the sub council then parted with the P747,857.14 for the pupil toilet block.
“The contractor was paid P100,000 as a contingency fee and value added tax was calculated at P107,142,86. In total the sub council paid P1,000,000,” he said.
The issue of Nkoyaphiri toilets arose when Rakgare toured the schools to check their readiness before re-opening in June following the relaxation of the coronavirus (COVID-19) restrictions.
The council received a furious backlash on social media when the public complained that the project did not look like it would be worth the P1m amount.
In the sub council’s defence, Katjinojiwa said the tender had gone through all the processes laid.
He said they did not favour anyone and if people think that there was corruption involved, then investigations should be conducted.
He said the door was open for all wishing to interrogate the tender documents as to how the sub council arrived at that amount.
However, Mmegi has learnt that some councillors were divided on the issue of Rakgare blasting the sub council in public.
A source revealed that the acrimony amongst councillors in Mogoditshane led to the embarrassing episode that played out in front of the media this week.
The councillors allegedly suspect powerful forces were behind the contractor winning the tender.
“We are aware that some had a secret meeting regarding this tender and they wanted to go and report the matter to Directorate on Corruption and Economic Crime (DCEC).
We are much aware of what is happening.
What is sad is that they want to involve council employees in their dirty political wars,” a ruling Botswana Democratic Party source revealed.