Human Settlements, Urban Planning, Cooperatives Governance and Traditional Affairs MEC Lebohang Maile, says they are concerned as the provincial government about the allegations made by Johannesburg mayor Herman Mashaba that 1.3 billion has been stolen.
Maile says this has been widely alleged without any evidence. The MEC continued to say that he cannot be accused of stealing money in the Alexandra Renewal Project (ARP) because he was never involved in the project.
“The only benefit I have from the government is my salary and my pension that I work for,” said the MEC.
He added that it is lacking of truth to say that nothing has been done by the ARP.
Maile continued to say that mayor Mashaba uses the ARP as an excuse for lack of service delivery.
He called on people with evidence to come forward with information about people who benefited unduly to the APR.
“I am interested to know, if there are people who did wrong things, we want those people to be punished,” said Maile.
He says they welcome the probe by the mayor and hope the investigation would provide them with information.
Maile says they are reviving a number of projects that were killed by the city under Mashaba’s administration.
“The mayor likes playing victim, when he came in he said he was fighting corruption and closed a lot of projects,” said Maile.
Maile said that they will be putting pressure on Mashaba, not only for Alexandra issues but on the issues of the city.
“We will be attacking him systematically, you cannot be mayor and the only thing you do is complain about the previous administration,” added the MEC.
Maile went on say Mashaba cannot run the city by complaining.
“Mayor Mashaba likes complaining about corruption, I am not saying he should not, he must and we are his partner in fighting corruption by the way.”
