JOHANNESBURG – The Gauteng Department of Education on Monday said it condemned the assault of a pupil at the Adelaide Tambo School for the disabled in Soweto, allegedly at the hands of a food handler.

Another pupil captured the assault on the 16-year-old girl, who was subsequently forced off a bus out and left in the middle of nowhere.

READ: Province ‘disturbed’ by ‘rape’ at primary school

Department spokesperson Steve Mabona said that the food handler was suspended and was out on bail after a criminal case was opened.

“As a department, we are very disappointed by the incident. We are not going to tolerate any ill-treatment of our learners by our officials.”

WATCH: School-assault video: Department demands answers from principal

The department said the incident was not reported to the district office by the school. It learnt of it only when the video footage emerged.

“Officials from the Inclusion and Special Schools [section] went to the school this morning to investigate the incident. In addition, officials from Labour Relations have launched an investigation surrounding the circumstances of the incident so that disciplinary measures can be initiated,” the department said in a statement.

“The parent of the learner was alerted about the incident on 13 September after the school failed to inform her. She opened a case on the same day and the food handler was arrested [but] later released on bail, pending police investigations.”

WATCH: Suspect in schoolgirl-assault video arrested

The department added the food handler was no longer at the school, while the bus driver had been suspended from Monday.

“The process of counselling all affected learners has commenced,” the department said.

Gauteng Education MEC Panyaza Lesufi said: “We are disappointed about this incident – extra care must be afforded to learners with disabilities. It is shocking to see the escalating incidents of assault taking place in our schools. As a department we will act vigorously in making sure that the perpetrators face the might of the law.”

READ: St John’s teacher leaves school with immediate effect

African News Agency

The State Security Agency (SSA) has allegedly spent more than a billion rand in irregular expenditure over the past five years – and now refuses to account for this because its operations are “classified”.  

A joint investigation by Rapport and News24 has found that National Treasury has increasingly been at loggerheads with the SSA over the mismanagement of what has been estimated to amount to about R1.5 billion.

The abuse of funds allegedly includes the suspicious use of the SSA’s covert fund as well as breaches of prescribed procurement procedures.

Seven independent sources who are directly involved or have insight into Treasury and the country’s intelligence services confirmed that, between the 2012/13 and 2015/16 financial years, Treasury repeatedly asked the SSA for clarity on its expenditure. 

But, according to the same sources, the SSA won’t account for how this money was spent because its activities are “secret”. 

These sources say money budgeted for less secret operations was inexplicably moved to the covert fund and the spies can’t explain why that was necessary.

Last year, Treasury apparently even threatened to cut funding for secret operations entirely if the SSA could not account for at least some of its tender processes.  

“There was a big problem with the SSA’s funds,” said one source. “Treasury officials kept asking them how they tender for goods and services and they kept saying that they can’t tell us, because it is classified information. But some Treasury officials have the same level of security clearance as top SSA staff.

“Treasury understood they couldn’t have open tender processes and disclose their covert operations, but they asked SSA to at least submit a list of suppliers so that there could be a degree of oversight.” 

A second source, familiar with the negotiations between the SSA and Treasury, confirmed that SSA had asked to be exempt from prescribed tender processes and the Public Finance Management Act (PFMA) and other laws. 

“We always questioned if this sort of exemption would be justified,” said the source. 

These revelations come amid recent scandals in which it was alleged that intelligence services were being abused for political purposes. Earlier this month, Mail&Guardian reported that the SSA’s covert fund was abused to spy on Deputy President Cyril Ramaphosa. 

In 2014, City Press reported the existence of a covert unit which was allegedly tasked with driving political operations for President Jacob Zuma. A spy with close ties to Zuma, Thulani Dhlomo, was head of the special operations unit between 2012 and 2015. 

In 2014, City Press reported that this unit was linked to the campaign to purge senior SARS officials including acting commissioner Ivan Pillay and group executive Johan van Loggerenberg. 

But Dhlomo was last month appointed ambassador to Japan. Five sources said that this move came shortly after the irregular expenditure of hundreds of millions of rands of covert funds.  

Former SSA DG queried expenditure

It is understood that Sonto Kudjoe, the SSA’s former director general, resigned after repeatedly questioning the mismanagement of the unit’s finances.

In its 2013/14 annual report, the joint standing committee on intelligence indicated that the Department of State Security’s internal auditors had already found that the SSA’s covert funds were being misapplied and that procurement procedures were being violated. Nothing came of these findings.

In addition, the SSA received a qualified audit in the 2012/13 and 2014/15 financial years.

These Auditor General reports were tabled in Parliament as part of the joint standing committee on intelligence’s 2013/14 and 2015/16 annual reports. 

Repeated attempts to reach Dhlomo at his office in Japan were unsuccessful. 

Gift Masina, Dhlomo’s personal assistant and third secretary at the South African embassy in Tokyo, undertook to answer questions by email but failed to do so.

Treasury referred questions to the SSA, saying: “Unfortunately, the National Treasury officials from all the divisions have indicated they have no information on this matter”.

SSA spokesperson Brian Dube denied that the special operations unit had access to any “covert fund”, and insisted that the SSA sends monthly reports to Treasury.

“There have never been any audit findings about these unsubstantiated allegations. The SSA’s budget is allocated on the basis of an approved annual performance plan,” he said. 

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MEYERTON – Three people were killed and five others were injured when two cars collided on the R551 in Meyerton, Gauteng on Saturday afternoon, paramedics said.

READ: One dead in Cape Town crash

ER24 paramedics arrived on the scene at 4.45 pm and found fire and rescue services extricating some of the people trapped in the cars, ER24 spokeswoman Ineke van Huyssteen said.

“Upon further assessment, three people were declared dead on the scene and five others sustained injuries ranging from moderate to serious. One patient was in a serious condition and was airlifted to hospital by the ER24 Oneplan helicopter.”

ER24, as well as other medical services on the scene, transported the rest of the patients to nearby hospitals for further medical care. The cause of the crash was not yet known, Van Huyssteen said.

African News Agency

PORT ELIZABETH – A Durban man made a brief appearance in the Port Elizabeth Commercial Crimes Court on Friday, facing charges of fraud involving R24 million. 

The 43-year old KwaZulu-Natal businessman is charged with defrauding the Eastern Cape Department of Education out of R24 million. 

Vishal Seebran is no stranger to the courts, in 2014 he was acquitted in the East London Regional Court after allegations that he and two others tried to bribe former education boss, Modidima Mannya, into awarding stationery tenders to Seebran’s company, Paper Active, Daily Disptach reported at the time.

At the time, the three allegedly wanted to be reinstated in a multimillion-rand tender process after they had been disqualified the previous year. 

In his case before the Port Elizabeth Commercial Crimes Court, the State alleges that between October and December 2009, Seebran through his company, submitted fraudulent tax certificates and false letters to the department, in order to be awarded tenders worth R24 million. 

Listed in the indictment, are three companies — Paper Active (Pty) Ltd, Mega Papers (Pty) Ltd, and African Paper Products (Pty) Ltd — Seebran is a director of each company. Seebran is also facing a charge of forgery in relation to the forging of a tax clearance certificates. 

The case against him was postponed until October 19 for consultations. 

Earlier in January, City Press reported that a contract worth more than R400 million was awarded to African Papers Products in December 2016. 

African Paper Products, of which Seebran is a director, was among five companies contracted by the Eastern Cape Department of Education to distribute stationery for the 2017 academic year. 

At the time Seebran was quoted as saying that the company delivered stationery in the Libode, Maluti and Lusikisiki districts. 

The Anti-Corruption Task Team of the Directorate for Priority Crime Investigation (the Hawks) started investigating the R24 million tender fraud case in February 2013. 

Eastern Cape Department of Education spokesperson, Mali Mtima could not immediately explain why Seebran was still on the government’s data base for tenders, despite serious allegations of fraud and an ongoing investigation by the Hawks. 

“When issues of this nature happen it is reported to treasury, if treasury is not happy then sanctions will take place,” he said. Mtima requested time to respond to queries in an email.

African News Agency

Cape Town – A “technical problem” could possibly have led to a Robben Island ferry partially sinking on Friday afternoon, the Robben Island Museum said. 

The 64 passengers and four crew members aboad the ferry, Thandi, had to be evacuated when the nose of the boat started to sink in rough seas, 3km from the Cape Town waterfront. 

Robben Island Museum senior ferry manager Sandresan Thandroyan said the ferry was used for the first time on Friday morning after undergoing lengthy maintenance work. 

He said the “technical problem” could have been made worse by severe weather conditions. 

Thandroyan said an investigation however still needed to be completed to determine the cause of the vessel’s problems. 

“From what we understand… there wasn’t any damage to the boat itself,” Thandroyan said. 

The museum hires the vessel from Yacoob Yachts. Yacoob Yachts could not be reached for comment. 

No passengers missing

Sea swells of up to 2m were reported in Cape Town on Friday afternoon, with winds of up to 65 km/h blowing from the south-southeast, South African Weather Service forecaster Stella Nake said. 

Thandi departed from the Cape Town harbour at 10:42 and left the Island at 13:05. 

The NSRI said it was activated at 14:18 to attend to passengers aboard the vessel.

Two NSRI vessels and a ferry from the Robben Island Museum ferried passengers and crew members to the waterfront, NSRI spokesperson Craig Lambinon said in a statement. 

City of Cape Town fire and rescue services’ Theo Layne said rescue operations were being complicated by extremely high seas and strong winds. 

No one was reported missing.

Two women were taken to hospital for treatment – one complaining of back pain and another for mild hypothermia. 

By Friday afternoon, authorities were still trying to retrieve Thandi from the ocean. 

Safety measures were in place

Thandroyan was unable to confirm whether the vessel sunk completely or not. 

Asked why the vessel went out despite warnings of strong winds, Thandroyan said ferrying was declared safe by Thandi’s master on Friday morning. 

“We all are fully aware that in Cape Town the weather does turn quite quickly, especially with the South Easter, so we could not predict that it [would],” he said. 

Thandroyan said all safety protocol was in place to save the lives of passengers. “Life jackets were in excess as required by legislation.” 

IOL previously reported that Western Cape Economic Opportunities MEC Alan Winde called the island’s museum “a blemish on our tourism industry” due to ferry breakdowns which left foreign visitors disappointed.

He said that not only does this have an economic impact, but is also damaging to Cape Town and South Africa’s tourism brand.

Winde, however, conceded that the situation had improved “since 2010, when ferry breakdowns were causing massive travel disruptions,” largely because management was now calling on private vessel owners to provide services when its own ferries were not operational.