Road Accident Fund (RAF) CEO Collins Letsoalo has denied any wrongdoing in connection with a R79 million lease deal
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Road Accident Fund (RAF) CEO Collins Letsoalo has denied any wrongdoing in connection with a R79 million lease agreement currently under investigation by the Special Investigating Unit (SIU).
Speaking at a media briefing on Monday, Letsoalo responded to media reports that a leaked preliminary SIU report had implicated him in bypassing proper procurement procedures to secure a lease for the RAF’s Johannesburg regional offices.
“Even if police pass, there’s a siren I sleep nicely at night. I know there’s nothing,” Letsoalo said.
According to the reports, Letsoalo may have bypassed the procurement committee’s advice and awarded the five-year contract to Mowana Properties, a bidder that had initially lost.
Letsoalo dismissed the allegations as baseless, insisting that the lease went through the appropriate governance channels.
“Mowana is not my friend. They manage assets on behalf of the GEPF it’s a state-related entity." he said.
He further claimed that the media narrative surrounding the deal was part of a targeted campaign to discredit him ahead of the end of his term in August.
"My contract is coming to an end in August and now we're going to see all these funny things, rehashing things that happened in 2021. I hear that it's a progressive move to make sure continuously every other week my name will be in the media for wrong reasons," he added.
Letsoalo also defended the decision to award the lease to Mowana, stating it came after several failed attempts over a number of years to secure new office space.
He said the previous building, Marble Towers, posed occupational safety risks and created confusion for claimants, many of whom mistakenly ended up in private legal offices located in the same building.
"The building cost per square metre is lower than Marble Towers. We didn’t just wake up and decide to pick a building there was a formal assessment team, criteria, and motivation submitted.”
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