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Minister of sport, arts and culture Nathi Mthethwa has announced that a forensic audit will be instituted by the National Arts Council (NAC) board into the mismanagement of the presidential employment stimulus programme (PESP).
This comes after the NAC board suspended CEO Rosemary Mangope and CFO Clifton Changfoot at the end of February due to mismanagement of the PESP funds. Mthethwa yesterday addressed a number of rumours and concerns around PESP, including that of people who received more than they asked for and individuals who used multiple sources to apply for funding, referring to Arthur Mafokate claims.
Mafokate, who has since said he did nothing wrong except follow due processes, was accused of using four companies. He denied owning some of the companies, saying they were non-profit organisations run by trustees.
Mthethwa refuted claims that R300m meant for creatives was finished. He said the money was in the NAC coffers but had been over-committed. The extra money wanted was about R4.8m. Mthethwa said the department wanted all people involved to be brought to book.
“We take this seriously because this incident has caused suffering among the practitioners and as a result they are frustrated. Giving a person more than he wanted cannot be a mistake. I don’t believe that. There is an investigation … on at NAC that includes duplication of applications and those who use various sources to apply.
“A lot of things are being reviewed. We hope the forensic audit will unpack everything and we look forward to recommendations. The procurement process of the company that will do investigations should start this week.”
Mthethwa said his department failed to secure more money to cover the shortfall caused by over-committing the R300m from Treasury. He said they were turned down due to the financial constraints but Treasury also complained about mismanagement of funds.
“But we promise to continue knocking to different doors for funds to assist the practitioners in the industry. I will like to issue an unconditional apology to the sector as a whole for being let down by government entities like NAC which exposed the most vulnerable sector … We want to have a very special focus on NAC and reprioritise the grant we have been giving the institution to deal with the situation.”
Mthethwa also said the third Covid-19 relief phase was on and the department had received over 6,000 applications. About 4,000 have already been adjudicated. – sowetan
Online Reporter