Accused of PPE graft businessman Hamilton Ndlovu is apparently ready to reveal the names of politicians who used his company to benefit themselves. | Supplied
DURBAN - Businessman Hamilton Ndlovu, who has been accused of scoring close to R172 million in personal protective equipment (PPE) contracts from the National Health Laboratory Service (NHLS), has said that he will “drop the names” of politicians involved in the graft.
Speaking exclusively to the Daily News, Ndlovu’s lawyer, advocate Sipho Bavuma, said that his client had never received the R172 million as alleged. Bavuma stated that in the upcoming trial in March, revelations by his clients would lead to the politicians who had benefited from the said PPE tender.
Ndlovu’s lawyer said that the narrative spread about his client was a concern as it did not deal with facts, but information that was not accurate. He decried that Ndlovu’s side of the story has not been given attention.
“Of the R172 million, my client received less than R69 million; we do not know where the rest of the figure went.
“What we do know is that names will be dropped and heads will roll because politicians used my client to irregularly benefit themselves at the expense of my client,” said Bavuma.
“There is over R90 million unaccounted for, and that missing amount must be traced, so it leads us to the officials who took the money.”
He added: “We will not hold back because we are aware they are trying, by all means, to frustrate my client and ensure that he is thrown under the bus. Just recently, there has been a drone hovering over his Durban property, and phones were tapped. We have also told the court about such things.”
According to Bavuma, his client was consistently receiving death threats from unknown people threatening him to not reveal the names of top government officials who were involved in the stealing of the money.
“With all his assets frozen, my client has no fighting chance, and despite him having been in business way before the whole PPE scandal, Ndlovu had made a living and built his assets to the value of R100 million. Now, everything has been unfairly taken away from him to ensure there are no other means to access funds for his legal fees.”
Bavuma said his client was also not happy with the curator after the court had granted a provisional order in favour of the SA Revenue Service (Sars) to freeze Ndlovu’s bank accounts and seize some of his luxury cars.
In the application, Ndlovu had unsuccessfully argued that he needed access to additional funds preserved under the Sars preservation order to fully and properly prepare and present their opposition to the review application.
Bavuma explained to the Daily News that Ndlovu would bring in a new court challenge to review the previous ruling that had further disadvantaged his client.
The Special Investigating Unit report, which President Cyril Ramaphosa made public in January, found that Ndlovu had apparently used a series of companies to compete for contracts worth millions.
The SIU said that it had obtained evidence that revealed that Ndlovu was the individual behind the submission of quotations by different entities, the purchase of the required PPE, and to some extent, delivery.
“The available evidence indicates that he is the owner of the entities and is both the direct and indirect beneficiary of the funds received from the NHLS,” said the SIU report.
“The entities and/or Mr Ndlovu failed to reveal the true nature of their relationship to [the] NHLS, and as such, obtained its contracts unlawfully and fraudulently from the NHLS.”
A source who had previously spoken to the publication claimed that Ndlovu was protecting certain prominent politicians who assisted him to win tenders.
“He is willing to take the fall for everything. Everybody turned their back on him.
“Some people helped pull the strings in the background, and shared the spoils with these guys,” said the source.
Contacted for comment, SIU spokesperson Kaizer Kganyago said: “The matter was brought before the Special Tribunal in December last year. We do not have any further comment.”
Daily News