Amidst the Covid-19 storm clouds and controversy, comes claims that Dr Vaccine doled out cash jobs for pals to PR the coronavirus campaigns. “Politics has strange bedfellows.’’ – Charles Dudley Warner
This week the focus falls on a high-profile Covid-19 and NHI minister of health, dubbed as Dr Vaccine, family friends, aunty, close associates, private assistants to the ANC at Luthuli House and a shadowy coronavirus communications tender deal with the Department of Health involving R82-million that was flagged irregular in Parliament by the Auditor-General. When the deadly health pandemic – corona virus or Covid-19 – hit South Africa almost a year ago, a terrified nation landed in the same boat, vowing not only to beat the life-threatening disease, but to survive this frightening ordeal.
Others, opportunistically eyed Covid-19 as a runaway cash cow and a get-rich-quick scheme that benefited corrupt individuals and businesses. Close on to 49 000 lost their lives and millions are jobless. Thankfully, the new SA’s free press-freedom of speech culture and investigative journalism continues to lift the lid on widespread corruption in government and the corporate world – thereby making SA one of the world’s most unequal societies with more than 60% of the population living off the welfare state’s dole system. Social media is playing a phenomenal role in keeping the taxpayers and citizens abreast of all the breaking news – the corrupt contacts and citizens’ outrage at rampant corruption in Covid-19 procurements.
Surprisingly, or not so surprisingly, health minister Dr Zweli Mkhize, a veteran of the anti-apartheid struggle, ANC government and ex-treasurer-general at ANC Luthuli House, became the newest headline-maker linked – allegedly according to the Special Investigative Unit – to a little-known public-relations outfit, Digital Vibes, described as “obscure’’ and had irregularly clinched an R82-million tender for communications from the Department of Health. The health minister, according to investigative journalist Pieter Louis-Myburgh’s probe published in the Daily Maverick, is closely linked to the triumvirate of women tenderpreneurs, Tahera Mather, Naadira Mitha and Radha Hariram, all of KwaDukuza-Stanger.
Once the article – headlined: Scorpio – Zweli Mkhize’s “family friend” and ex-private secretary pocket Covid-19 cash via R82-million Department of Health contracts, went viral and links were shared, WhatsApp went ablaze with the latest shenanigans emerging from the closed-shop Covid-19 personal procurement equipment (PPE), spin-doctoring and communications, further backed by pictorial Facebook posts by the tenderpreneurs and the ministry. The report also traces the procurement and consultancy relationships to Mkhize’s ministerial post at the Department of Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs (Cogta) and Mather features in both departments and the ANC in Johannesburg. In 2018, Digital Vibes scored R3,9 million contracts to promote a Cogta municipal unit. When the story broke, the national media went into overdrive with the eNCA TV and SAfm radio named the health minister and the tenderpreneurs in all headline blurbs.
Newsreader Nandika Shamini Beukes informed listeners in half-dozen bulletins that “more details were emerging’’ in the DoH debacle related to outsourced pandemic work. No-nonsense presenter Sakina Kamwendo got the investigative journalist on the other line to share how he cobbled the scoop; and how a deviation resulted in Digital Vibes becoming the preferred company for the National Health Insurance communications roll out. Louis-Myburg said over air: “Minister Mkhize had spoken to that point in parliament a little bit, (but) I dare say not too convincingly … the department had to do the NHI communication quickly. The Auditor-General flagged the deal initially as irregular and that they could have gone to market and the deal did not follow the open tender process.”
As Mkhize’s spokeswoman and family friends, the mystery deepens as to how Mather travelled on the minster’s entourage and became a paid consultant at Digital Vibes, whose head honcho is Hariram, with Mitha playing roles between the consultancy and the minister. • Strategically, the Daily Maverick published a photograph of the minister with Mather and Mitha against a backdrop of Rand notes.
• Somehow, Mkhize and Mather have been friends since the 1990s, going back to his years of Health MEC and KZN Premier.
• A 2017 happy New York, New York photograph shows Mkhize with Tahera Mather and Khusela Diko, since then President Cyril Ramaphosa’s suspended, embattled spokeswoman over PPE tenders.
• Amidst the pending probe into Diko’s alleged involvement in the PPE scandal, also involving her husband, King Madzikane Thandisizwe Diko, the 43-year-old AmaBhaca king died last week after a short illness as the latest Covid-19 story broke.
SA taxpayers are eagerly awaiting responses from the minister and the Digital Vibes Three, while the DoH director-general investigates the Covid-NHI saga.
Marlan Padayachee is a seasoned journalist who heads a media communication strategy, publishing and research. Contact Marlan on: marlan.padayachee@gmail.com.
