R128 million MyCiTi bus tender lies in limbo

A whopping R128 million for the procurement of electric MyCiTi buses is now in limbo as movement on the contentious tender, which already led to the suspension of a senior official, is at the mercy of a forensic investigation.

The City of Cape Town’s 2018/19 capital adjustments budget was approved by the council on Thursday. An amount of R443.8m has been included in the adjustments budget. Mayco member for finance Johan van der Merwe said unspent funds were not lost, but were added to the current capital budget.

The adjusted amount brings the City’s current capital budget for 2018/19 to about R8.85 billion. The unspent R128m was part of a total R484m adjusted budget for the 2018/19 financial year. The adjusted budget, tabled at Thursday’s full council meeting, represents money that was not spent in the previous financial year of 2017/18 and was now transferred.

On the buses, mayco committee member for transport and urban development Brett Herron said the first tests on Hospital Bend initially failed. “We made the changes on the buses. We tested it again and it was given the green light. The bus had to go to Pretoria for testing (at the SA Bureau of Standards) and that has been done. The project can’t go ahead because of the Bowman’s investigation into the tender,” Herron said.

ANC councillor Bheki Hadebe said the issue with the buses had been clouded by controversy. “This is exactly why there is an investigation into this matter. “We were told that this project date was in October; a year later the first bus was delivered. Then it took another year for it to be tested. The bus could not even go up Hospital Bend. It couldn’t drive 60kmAn Now you want to come here and ask us to approve this. It can’t be right. Take that bus back to China,” he said.

Mayor Patricia de Lille said adjustments to the capital budget for directorate and departmental submissions totalled R484.9m. “There was an additional recommendation by mayco to reduce the capital adjustment budget by R41.5m related to the grant for the disaster management of the drought, and therefore the total capital adjustment budget is R443.4m.

“Some of the reasons for the roll-overs across directorates are vendors not delivering goods by June 30 despite the fact that orders were placed timeously, supply constraints on imported equipment and projects delayed due to poor contractor performance,” she said. De Lille said capital grant roll-overs amounting to R172.1m were proposed in the 2018/19 financial year.

Roll-overs of approved 2017/18 private donations and unspent grant allocations from provincial government amounted to R250.6m and were proposed for inclusion in the 2018/19 operating budget, De Lille said. The Safety and Security Department had R2.8m roll-over proposed for the appointment of the “Rent-a-Cop” initiative. It was funded by SA Breweries and formed part of the holistic Alcohol Game Changer intervention.

The agreement was signed in the latter part of the 2017/18 financial year but there were delays, De Lille said. There has also been a R951 908 roll-over proposed in the area-based directorates for the community development workers project, funded by the province. ACDP councillor Demetrius Dudley described the adjustments budget as a fiscal dump.

“They have failed to show that they can spend the money. This points to poor leadership, poor management and poor controls. It seems that the City is more worried about buying printers and office equipment. “How do we spend R79 000 on furniture? How will that help the residents of this City? We have seen that auditor general report on R47m irregular expenditure. And where did that hurt the DA? In their pride,” he said.