Health corruption should anger us

THE scale of state corruption in South Africa is so vast it has become meaningless.

Corruption has, in its daily manifestations, lost much of its capacity to shock and outrage.

President Cyril Ramaphosa estimated that state looting during the lost decade of the Jacob Zuma presidency was in the order of R1trillion. There’s never been any explanation of how the government arrived at that estimate, but it’s a figure that trips daintily off the tongue.

And it expediently side-steps the large-scale corruption that preceded Zuma and was tacitly sanctioned by the ANC. Former president Thabo Mbeki and Cabinet colleagues turned a blind eye to Cabinet ministers pocketing R1billion in the arms procurement scandal, the start of the impunity culture within government. A billion is not a trillion, but hell, one has to start somewhere.

It’s a statement also calculated to reassure us that under his administration, corruption has ended. When announcing the launch of Covid-19 emergency relief funds last year – drawing on a few billion from South Africa’s resident super-wealthy and a further $4.3bn (R81bn) from the International Monetary Fund – Ramaphosa was unequivocal, every cent would be accounted for.

That’s not how it worked out. While there have been no allegations of malfeasance at the private-sector run Solidarity Fund, in the state sector Covid-19 has been one long Christmas celebration.

In July last year, the Special Investigating Unit (SIU) was investigating an amount of R2bn of the government’s spending on emergency relief efforts – primarily for the acquisition of personal protective equipment (PPE) for health workers – as fraudulent. By September last year, that had more than doubled, with R5bn of the R10.4bn suspected as having been fraudulently spent. This week, the SIU told Parliament the amount under criminal investigation had increased further, to R14.2bn, out of a Treasury spend of R30.7bn.

If the spending on Covid-19 relief is anything to go by, the looting-toexpenditure ratio for the Ramaphosa administration, despite all the president’s fine assurances, has been relatively consistent.

Out of every R2 spent by the government, about R1 – that we know of – has been stolen.

Arguably, as worrying as the scale of the criminality is the level of impudence. These are not people who fear the police and the courts.

Despite Honest Cyril’s shock and horror over Covid corruption, no one has yet been jailed or even prosecuted.

Take Ramaphosa’s presidential spokesperson, Khusela Diko. Her hubby scored a corrupt R125mCovid contract, which led to her first being put on “special leave” by Ramaphosa for six months and then suspended.

Diko is reportedly still earning a R1.3m salary and benefits. She has stated very clearly that, contrary to ANC instructions, she will not resign from her leadership positions in the party.

The ANC’s distinct lack of enthusiasm for prosecuting comrades inevitably impacts law enforcement. The SIU approach has been not to seek convictions but rather to recover stolen funds. It told Parliament that its Special Tribunal is currently busy with 15 PPE cases that should recoup R365m.

Admittedly, there are also good, pragmatic reasons for the SIU approach. The seizure of ill-gotten gains is considerably easier and faster than the costly process of building a multitude of watertight criminal cases against relatively small-time offenders.

However, the problem with the SIU approach is that it makes state looting a gamble still worth taking: there is virtually no chance of criminal sanctions and a minuscule chance of forfeiture.

If one examines the hundreds of pages of Covid expenditure details released by Treasury last year, in response to opposition and civil society pressure, what strikes one is how amateurish and blatant the thieving is. That the looting could be so unconstrained points, yet again, to a deeply compromised public service.

Because of political pressure, the Ramaphosa administration has made much show of addressing the theft of Covid emergency funds.

It’s been an abject failure but we can’t allow ourselves to just take it in our stride.

All state looting is terrible but there should be a special place in hell for those who steal from those working with the sick and dying.