An urgent meeting to discuss alleged irregularities around Parliament’s security will soon be convened by its speaker and the National Council of Provinces (NCOP) chairperson, South African Broadcasting Corporation (SABC) radio news reported on Sunday.
National Assembly speaker Baleka Mbete and NCOP chairperson Mninwa Mahlangu would shortly a convene a meeting with the Public Works Department, the police and all relevant stakeholders on the alleged security scam in Parliament, said the SABC.
On Friday, media reports broke on an alleged corruption scandal involving Parliament’s multimillion-rand security system.
The Mail & Guardian reported that crucial security functions at Parliament, the South African Revenue Service, the KwaZulu-Natal legislature, two parastatals and several big private companies are in the hands of a firm with a history of corrupt practices.
The M&G said that Africa Strategic Asset Protection (Asap) won a R32-million access-control contract and a R12-million asset-tracking contract for Parliament in what appear to be clear cases of tender-rigging.
Claims of ”fraud, theft and corruption” in connection to this were made in Parliament on Thursday by the Freedom Front Plus.
Asap Company director Jacques du Plessis was reported as saying on Friday to a Cape newspaper that rumours about alleged irregularities were a case of ”sour grapes”. — Sapa