The National Union of Metalworkers of SA has joined calls for the declassification of the Nkandla report.
|||Johannesburg - The National Union of Metalworkers of SA has joined calls for the declassification of the Nkandla report - dubbing the costs on President Jacob Zuma’s Nkandla private homestead “the worst form of squandering of public resources”.
In an unsparing criticism on Thursday, Numsa general secretary Irvin Jim said the expenses represented “an unprecedented expenditure since the democratic breakthrough in 1994”.
He said only an open and transparent inquiry into the expenditure would end the suspicion of corruption.
“A dark cloud of suspicion of corruption and looting of the public purse hangs over this whole matter, and only an expeditious and transparent process will settle or resolve the matter,” Jim said in Joburg.
The briefing came after Numsa held its special national executive committee meeting on Tuesday. Jim said South Africans deserved to know the underlying reasons that led to the Department of Public Works and others involved in the approval and use of taxpayers’ money “renovating the private residence of a sitting president”.
“Our response is quite clear - the Nkandla renovations represent the worst form of squandering of public resources to satisfy the private accumulation interests of tenderpreneurs.”
The latest reports have suggested that the construction costs on Zuma’s homestead had escalated from R27.7 million to more than R206m.
Numsa’s stance is expected to further fuel the simmering tensions within the tripartite alliance, especially its fractured relationship with union federation Cosatu.
The Star