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OUT OF THEIR DEPTH

By Mbongeni Mbingo | 2024-11-29

If it wasn’t so serious, we would marvel at the sheer audacity of this entire charade and pretence to find the stolen E340m that was taken from the people of this country.

But, the thing is, it is painful to watch as people shuffle around as though they care when in fact, they are doing nothing but looking to benefit from the entire exercise.

It’s been more than five years since the spectacular Ecsponent collapse and yet we are nowhere near to anything – including just anything meaningful to give those whose money was stolen from them the peace of mind that at the very least, something will come of anything that pretends to be an exercise to bring those responsible to book.

Instead, the victims of this scam are being sent from pillar to post – and of late, parliament has taken over the gimmick, and now things look even worse.

Committee
Let me break it for you, dear reader; nothing will come of this parliament exercise. Nothing.
This select committee business only serves to line the pockets of those in it.

Trust me, this is it. It will serve no point at all, except that we will see the finger pointing getting a little more animated, heated, and perhaps even more dramatic.

Why do I say this? It is simple. We must ask ourselves what the point is for this select committee, whose report is worse than the Funduzi Forensic Report they have not even bothered to debate. The point is that they have no clue what they are looking for, except the potential to look good in the process and then make an extra from the sittings they are piling up.

It is a huge scam, and if I was asked, we would say thank you to this lot and be confined to the process in court, even though nayo leyo is worth a page of its own on another day.

Which brings one to conclude that this is a whole hopeless exercise that will only end in another huge cost and nothing tangible, while the real people who were robbed suffer – and die.
For starters, what is parliament looking for, in taking this issue up? Why is parliament setting aside a committee to investigate this issue further when there is a forensic report, submitted by a company that has more credentials than Funduzi Forensics (whatever else their name is) which has not been debated at all?

How is a select committee, which has no experience whatsoever in this type of investigation, except to stage a talk show, spending our money pretending to be doing something they are clueless about?

You would expect that parliament would scrutinise the Cliffe Dekker Hofmeyr (CDH) report and then summon those people to defend their report if it turns out that it has gaps or does not provide the answers we need.

In any case, wasn’t Funduzi given the whole year to spread their propaganda in parliament – and we are still deep in a drugs shortage crisis! My God, this country is so beautifully naive it makes the blood boil.

Anyway, let me get back to the subject matter. For me, there is nothing left to convince me that the select committee is invested in this process enough to table tangible outcomes, except that this will drag for the duration of another five years.

My suspicion is based on their running around like headless chickens talking to the same people who are at the centre of this scandal – and then having the audacity to tell us that they couldn’t find anything except that everyone points a finger at someone.

Reported
Apparently, the chairperson of the parliament select committee is reported to have admitted that each of the people they spoke to, points to ‘the real sigebengu’ and that they are wasting time trying to find the truth from them.

This is a no-brainer, of course. No one is going to admit to have even seen any Ecsponent money, if you ask me. And, we are dealing with the cleverest of smartalecs, who know exactly what they are doing. Anyone who has followed how Ecsponent was set up, and its experiences in other countries, know who the real sigebengu is – except laka-gogo.

As to why the select committee has to pretend that it is better than Lukhozi, it really beats me. As to why they have to waste our money chasing dead-ends, really is the scandal that must be exposed.

There is no reason for any select committee to be looking for Dave van Niekerk in Pretoria or anywhere in the world, at our expense. So, if it was up to me, Minister Neal Rijkenberg should simply ask for the money back from the MPs, because it is clear to me that this is the real fraud we must put an end to.

If we find the energy and time to travel to Pretoria to speak to a person of interest, then it has to be at his expense, because after all, he is the one who refused to be summoned to parliament. Kona what kind of parliament are we, to be led by the nose by a man who is clearly at the centre of all of this?

By the way, if Cliffe Dekker Hofmeyr, for all their experience and reputation in this kind of job, did not bother to speak to Dave, wouldn’t they have been the better to do so?

Kudlalwa ngalaMaswati, because they lost money and it was their fault. This is painful to watch and I would caution MPs to be a little more empathetic when they handle this discussion.
People have lost their lives as a result of this fraud and here they are having tea and biscuits with the people who should be held responsible.

And then they will have the sheer audacity to tell us that this thing is complicated. No, it is not complicated, MPs are just not up to the task – or up to the level of providing a way forward. MP Welcome Dlamini probably has a point that the taxpayer should not be made to pay for money that was stolen right in front of those who are paid handsomely to ensure this type of thing was stopped dead in its tracks.

There is no need for the finger-pointing. The answer lies in who should be held responsible. If MPs are charmed by Dave van Niekerk, then it should not make government the scapegoat. The people who are to blame are known, and they are there.

The organisations that have watched and continue to fold their arms are there and dare I say, have the muscle and the money to refund all of us.

In any case, what we the people want to see is action – tangible action – being taken. We want the political will to find the those culpable, not the sideshow that only serves to divert the attention from the real scandal.

In which case, we will point the finger at this Parliament as culpable, for the answers are right in their faces.

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