Question NW97 to the Minister of Home Affairs
24 July 2019 - NW97
van der Merwe, Ms LL to ask the Minister of Home Affairs
(a) What number of cases with regard to corruption in his department involving officials marrying South African citizens to foreign nationals with the aim of securing citizenship and/or permanent residency (i) have been reported, (ii) are currently being investigated internally by his department and (iii) have been resolved, (b) what number of officials of his department have been charged criminally for the specified crimes against the State and (c) what plans will he put in place to combat this issue status?
Reply:
(a)(i) Between 2015 and 2019, a total of 84 fraudulent marriage related cases involving officials alleged to have been involved in marrying citizens to foreign nationals were reported to the Counter Corruption Unit.
(a)(ii) 9 of these cases are currently being investigated internally.
(a)(iii) 59 cases have been resolved.
(b) 16 cases have been referred for disciplinary proceedings.
(c) The Department has a Counter Corruption & Security Branch responsible for fraud and corruption prevention and eradication. Moreover, in terms of the Departments’ Information Security Policy, all users responsible for capturing and registering marriages on the National Population Register system within the domain of the organisation, are assigned with biometric fingerprint authentication, to hold users liable for fraudulent activities detected and information stored digitally, at any point in the Department systems.
END