BAMB senior officers fired over P10m sleaze

Innocent Selatlhwa | Tuesday December 12, 2017 17:26

 

According to sources, there has been a stock shortage amounting to P10 million from the various depots around the country and more officials are facing the chop.

This comes just two years after the Parliamentary Committee on Statutory Bodies and State Enterprises was told of stock theft by some senior staff members in Mahalapye and Francistown.

“The officers are accused of having taken some of the stock and sold it for their personal use. So far the affected areas are Francistown, Gaborone, Jwaneng, Moshupa, Pitsane and Tutume,” a source who preferred anonymity said.

Even though details are quite sketchy, back in 2015 the Parliamentary committee learnt that officers at BAMB and the National Strategic Grain Reserves were charged with theft and fraud after an internal audit discovered that they had been looting national silos tonnes of grains over prolonged periods.

The audit discovered that more than 3,000 bags of sorghum (50kgs), especially the Panda sorghum, were stolen from Francistown and Mahalapye BAMB storages and taken to the millers between February 2012 and April 2013.

Communications and public relations manager Kushata Modiakgotla confirmed the expulsions. “It is true that BAMB has parted ways with some staff members. However it is worth noting that the process is still ongoing and has not been finalised,” she said. Modiakgotla would not divulge the names of the affected employees citing confidentiality between the employer and the employees.

She said the disciplinary hearings were put in place for the said staff members to account for stock shortage. Modiakgotla would not confirm the P10 million figure. “The process of accounting is ongoing with the final stock shortage to be determined upon completion of the process,” she said.

BAMB has also made headlines after tonnes of rotten beans were discovered at some of its storage facilities across the country. In one incident several years back, tonnes of rotten beans were found dumped at a storage facility near Sebele in Gaborone North with no official coming forward to account for the waste.