Tag: investigation

Categories : Ethics and Law General InterestTags :

Health Dept Suspends DG Buthelezi over Digital Vibes Tender

On By ModernMedia
Photo by Tingey Injury Law Firm on Unsplash

In the latest development of the R150 million Digital Vibes tender fallout, Health department director-general Dr Sandile Buthelezi has been placed on precautionary suspension 

On Sunday, health ministry spokesperson Foster Mohale  confirmed Buthelezi’s suspension following a Special Investigating Unit (SIU) report into the alleged tender fraud. Deputy DG Dr Nicolas Crisp will take over as acting DG until the completion of Buthelezi’s hearing process. Buthelezi had previously been on leave.

Mohale said that while the R150m Digital Vibes communications contract was already secured when Buthelezi assumed the DG role, it was his inaction in his role as heady of accounting authority regarding the contract that led to the suspension, said Mohale. 

The tender process was rife with irregularities, involving fictitious companies and doctoring scores of bidding companies.

“The procurement process was … a sham, designed and conducted to reach the predetermined result that Digital Vibes would be appointed,” lead investigator Rajendra Chunilall said in the SIU’s founding affidavit.

Former health director-general Precious Matsoso told the SIU that Tahera Mather, a friend of Dr Mkhize’s and a beneficial owner of Digital Vibes, began work at the department straight after Dr Mkhize’s appointment as minister. Matsotso had been pressured by Dr Mkhize to ensure that Mather was hired. Instead of a public tender for the National Health Insurance (NHI) communications contract as advised by the Treasury, it was issued as a closed tender to ten companies.

Two of these companies did not exist and six of which, including a computer equipment supplier and a graphic design company, did not respond as the tender was out of their scope, according to forensic accountant Hesti le Roux’s investigation.

Mather is also alleged to have created a fraudulent profile for Digital Vibes with the relevant skills and experience, including a fake team some of whom never worked for Digital Vibes and were not paid. 

Due to this rigging, only Digital Vibes and Brandswell responded; the latter had the upper hand as its R69m quote was far cheaper than Digital Vibes’ R141m,

However, the department then inexplicably issued a second RFP, amending the requirements.

Brandswell was “irregularly and irrationally” marked down by the department’s five-member tender evaluation committee (TEC), which included deputy director-general Anban Pillay and head of communications Popo Maja. This was despite Brandswell being a “long-standing and reputable communication solution service provider”, Le Roux said.

“Clearly, the recommendation by the TEC to award the contract to Digital Vibes was invalid in terms of the provisions [of] the constitution, because the procurement process was not fair, equitable, transparent, competitive and/or cost-effective. Therefore, the service level agreement that was concluded with Digital Vibes should be declared invalid,” Le Roux concluded.

Source: Times Live

Categories : COVID General InterestTags :

WHO Team in China Denied Key COVID Information

On By ModernMedia

The World Health Organization team sent to China to investigate the origins of the COVID virus have been frustrated in their efforts to secure key data.

Team member Dominic Dwyer, infectious disease expert, said that they had only been given a summary instead of the raw patient data that they had requested.

Raw, anonymised patient data is part of standard outbreak investigation, Dwyer said, and this was particularly important because half of the initial 174 patients had no contact with the wet market.

“That’s why we’ve persisted to ask for that,” said Dwyer. “Why that doesn’t happen, I couldn’t comment. Whether it’s political or time or it’s difficult.”

Although Wuhan is the site of the initial outbreak, China has sought to cast doubt on its origin there, pointing to a source outside the country that may have come in with frozen food.

US national security adviser Jake Sullivan said that he had “deep concerns” over the initial findings of the investigation, saying that “It is imperative that this report be independent, with expert findings free from intervention or alteration by the Chinese government.”

Peter Ben Embarek, the WHO delegation leader, said that the virus likely had an animal origin and may have taken a “very long and convoluted path involving also movements across borders”. The possibility that it may have travelled in frozen food is worth investigating, he added.

After their two week quarantine, the WHO team members were only allowed to go on visits organised by their Chinese hosts. Thea Kolsen Fischer, an immunologist and another WHO team member, said to the New York Times that she saw the investigation as “highly geopolitical”.

“Everybody knows how much pressure there is on China to be open to an investigation and also how much blame there might be associated with this,” she said.

Team member Peter Daszak, and president of the EcoHealth Alliance, said that it “was not my experience”.

“As lead of animal/environment working group I found trust and openness with my China counterparts. We did get access to critical new data throughout,” he tweeted.

“New data included environmental and animal carcass testing, names of suppliers to Huanan market, analyses of excess mortality in Hubei, range of Covid-like symptoms for months prior, sequence data linked to early cases and site visits with unvetted live question and answer.”

Source: The Guardian