CAPE TOWN - Transport Minister Fikile Mbalula on Tuesday said a forensic investigation was under way to determine who the 3 000 ghost workers are, who were found drawing salaries at the Passenger Rail Agency of SA (Prasa).
Mbalula announced this but could not confirm if the ghost employees uncovered by an internal campaign called Operation Ziveze (meaning show yourself) were part of Prasa’s current staff complement.
“I can't confirm that the 3 000 are part of the 17000 employees as more detailed verification of who got paid to which bank account is being undertaken.
“The forensic work, which is in the second phase, would determine that, including how this grand scam has been implemented at Prasa,” he said.
He made the statement when he was briefing the Standing Committee on Public Accounts (Scopa), following the committee’s visit to Prasa in the Western Cape and Gauteng in January and March.
Mbalula told Scopa that Operation Ziveze uncovered 3 000 ghost workers in the entity’s system and the payment of salaries was stopped last year.
DA MP Alf Lees said the identification of the ghost employees was good work on the part of the entity, but the number of ghost workers was shocking.
“As at the end of February there were 16 985 employees at Prasa. Are the 3 000 included in that number, or have they already been removed,” he asked.
Mbalula said Prasa was a “broken place”.
“It is a system of corruption within human resources, meaning somebody has orchestrated a scam to steal money from the organisation. That is how broken Prasa is,” he said.
“In a normal company you can’t afford to have one ghost employee. We have 3 000. Since last year December stoppage (of salaries) was done from paying those people, none of those people have actually come forward to claim they are being owed or something,” Mbalula said.
Asked by DA MP Alexandra Beukes what was being done to clean up the Prasa system, he said work was under way.
“That work is being undertaken and implemented as we speak and I expect the board to brief Scopa in detail on that important work.
“There is money that is going out of the system to pay ghost workers, which is a scam and fraud undertaken at Prasa,” he said.
Mbalula also told Scopa that a total of 737 employees were acting in various roles across the Prasa group at a cost of R8 843 649.77.
“Currently Prasa has over 3 500 vacancies nationally. This represents a 19% (vacancy rate) which remains unacceptable high,” he said.
“This is a matter that remains on our radar and progress on lowering the rate to lower levels will be monitored and reported on a quarterly basis,” he added.
However, Mbalula said they remained seized with the arduous task of getting Prasa back following years of sub-par performance, failure to spend on its capital programme and corruption.
“Our eyes are on the ball and we continue to hold the board accountable for the delivery on the targets that were prioritised in the shareholder compact.
“Among key targets is stabilising the company by filling key positions at senior management, recovering the rail operation in 10 corridors while paying attention to operational safety and security.”
He noted that there were a number of positions that were occupied in an acting capacity, including the positions of CEO and CFO, and progress was being made to fill the vacancies.
According to Mbalula, the Prasa board has since embarked on a review of the organisational design and business model to make necessary and suitable changes to the structure and model of the group.
“The new operating model and organisational design will be implemented in a phased manner commencing in the new financial year,” he said, adding that the board would brief Scopa fully on the time frames for implementation.