A senior official in the KwaZulu Natal transport & human settlements department is under fire over a series of procurement irregularities, including committing the department to an extra R250m that was not budgeted for in a R600m subsidised public transport tender.
Internal documents leaked to the Sunday Times show that head of department Siboniso Mbhele ignored red flags raised by senior officials over the tender, and also overturned decisions by adjudicating committees to push through millions of rands in irregular variations of road construction tenders.
While no link could be found between the successful bidders and Mbhele, an internal review of his behaviour conducted by transport MEC Siboniso Duma’s office recommended that he, along with other officials in the department, be hauled before a disciplinary hearing as irregular expenditure constitutes financial misconduct.
“The head of department is the accounting office of the department. Apart from his general obligations to ensure compliance with the law and to prevent irregularities, he is bound by the Public Finance Management Act and treasury regulations to ensure proper financial management of the department and of its provisioning systems,” the report said.
In the bus subsidy tender for communities in the Ugu district on the southeastern coast of KwaZulu-Natal, officials — including CFO Thabani Nkosi — wrote several letters to Mbhele in April informing him of several anomalies, two months after the successful bidder Ugu Transport Services (UTS) was informed it had won the lucrative contract. These included that:
- the tender’s validity to July 25 2024 had already expired when it was brought to his office in August 2024;
- the tender amount, some R673m over seven years, was R256m more than budgeted for; and
- the the bid was anti-competitive because the advertisement required bidders to have operating licences for the specific routes covered by the contract, instead of just operating licences.
This suggests there could only be one candidate that met the criteria.
The department’s supply chain policy requires that extensions of a bid’s validity be requested before the expiration of the date of the current validity, something Nkosi pointed out in correspondence to Mbhele.
The investigation by the MEC’s office also uncovered discrepancies in that the tender closing report stated that only one bid was received, while the bid evaluation committee’s report stated that four bids were received.
“Based on the current contracts, the department does not have the budget to cater for the over-expenditure, and should this bid go through on the current bid value, the estimated over-expenditure will increase to over R200m per annum,” Nkosi said in his letter. “Therefore in view of the above, I cannot sign the order approval form and approve the issuing of an order for an irregular process.”
In a handwritten response, stamped April 17 2025, Mbhele dismissed concerns about the tender’s validity, saying service provider UTS had signed on July 19 2024.
On the budget, he wrote: “Approval was supported by DDG [Fikile] Sithole and BAC [the bid adjudication committee] also awarded the contract. DDG Sithole to ensure that the contract does not exceed the available budget.”
MEC Duma expects all categories of staff to comply with supply management processes in the department when procuring goods and services ... He always ensures that the department works with provincial treasury, as was the case with the previous administrations, to ensure this compliance
— Ndabezinhle Sibiya, spokesperson for KZN transport MEC Siboniso Duma
Mbhele also said there had been no appeals since the award was published, and that the contract had to go ahead, because if it did not it would have a negative impact on service delivery.
According to an internet search, UTS is a consortium made up of minibus taxi and bus providers, while bid documents show that the company’s two directors are Lizwi Maphumulo and Duduzekile Maphumulo. In terms of the same documents, the company would, from the start of September, supply 47 buses and two 35-seater buses that would travel a combined 1.6-million kilometres a year for seven years.
Besides the subsidy, the buses would still collect fares from passengers from any of 50 pickup points across the district to the town of Port Shepstone and back. UTS had the previous iteration of this contract from 2012 until 2019, and it was extended in May of that year for five years.
On Saturday Maphumulo said: “I am not aware of any investigation, it’s news to me. I cannot comment on the rest as you said there is an investigation.”
The Sunday Times understands that Mbhele has been on sick leave. Contacted this week, Mbhele confirmed that he was unwell and referred the Sunday Times to the department, saying he was not permitted to talk.
Duma’s spokesperson, Ndabezinhle Sibiya, said they would not comment on the matter as it was ongoing, but the Sunday Times understands that the MEC has shared the report with KwaZulu-Natal premier Thami Ntuli.
“In the seventh administration, as guided by this policy, MEC Duma expects all categories of staff to comply with supply management processes in the department when procuring goods and services,” Sibiya said. “In this regard, he always ensures that the department works with provincial treasury, as was the case with the previous administrations, to ensure this compliance.”
He added that Duma was satisfied that all the checks and balances that were put in place by the fourth, fifth, and sixth administrations are still working.
Ntuli’s spokesperson, Lindelani Mbatha, said Duma had reported that Mbhele had failed to act on instances of misconduct. “Following this, the matter was referred to the legal team for guidance and advice. The issue is receiving the joint attention of both the premier and the MEC, who are committed to ensuring that due process is followed and that the matter is handled with the seriousness it deserves.”
In February 2022 Mbhele was approached by the department’s construction directorate to approve variation orders in respect of 11 road construction projects — under two contracts — in the Empangeni, Durban and Pietermaritzburg areas. The projects totalled R731.1m and were to grow by an extra R146.2m after Covid work stoppages, rain, additional work to repair damage to already completed works, and costs for additional works and Covid claims.
By the time the requests came to Mbhele, the department’s BAC had rejected the request because it felt the directorate had displayed poor planning and decision-making, and the auditor-general had already found the original contracts to have been irregularly awarded.
The BAC was of the view that the construction directorate should rather adjust the scope of work to prevent an increase in the overall value. In its submission to Mbhele, the directorate disagreed that the issues were due to poor planning, saying lockdown regulations due to Covid had a real impact, and that leaving the projects incomplete would have “catastrophic financial implications for the department and communities that would far outweigh academic and technical debates on matters of irregularity”.
“Further, there is a very likely possibility that the remaining incomplete works on various sites could be further damaged either by aggrieved communities who will/could be protesting against delayed and/or non-service delivery,” the submission said.
“The scope of the investigations should also include the conduct of the associated officials concerned who were responsible for the issues referred to. If the allegations of the irregularities are identified, then disciplinary hearings should be held in accordance with applicable prescripts.”
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