Question NW1540 to the Minister of Public Works and Infrastructure

Reply:

The Minister of Public Works and Infrastructure:

((1) At the emergence of the scam the Anti-Corruption Unit instituted investigations to determine amongst others whether there was evidence to suggest the involvement of the Department of Public Works and Infrastructure (DPWI) officials in the scam. The assistance of the law enforcement agencies were also solicited in this respect, criminal referrals were made and investigations were initiated by SAPS whom the assigned investigators worked closely with, the Anti-Corruption Unit and provided regularupdates.InvestigationsbytheSAPSarestillongoing.Throughcoordination

of investigation efforts with the internal ICT division, it was also established that the emails containing DPWI officials’ credentials didn’t originate from the DPWI ICT infrastructurenetworkorsystems.Emanatingfromthefindingsoftheinvestigations alludedtoabove,itwasresolvedthatthroughtheChiefDirectorateCommunications and Marketing the Department should launch an awareness campaign in an endeavour to alert members of the public to validate requests for quotations purported to be issued by theDPWI.

SCM’s contribution to this is as follows; “In keeping with the departments zero tolerance approach to fraud and corruption, an on-going awareness campaign is undertaken and the departmental website warns all officials and service providers about fraudulent order scams. Any purchase order or quotation/tender purported to be from DPWI must first be verified prior to delivery. The Department has also availed specific contact names and numbers on the website for both the internal staff and the service providers to enquire and report such scams.

2. IninstancesbroughttotheattentionoftheAnti-CorruptionUnitwhereDepartmental officials’credentialsareusedintheperpetrationoftenderfraud,theAnti-Corruption Unit conducts preliminary assessments to determine whether there is a need to institute an investigation into the matter. Extensive investigations conducted as highlighted in Paragraph 1 above has thus far revealed no linkages between Departmental officials and the fraudsters perpetrating thescam.

3. As highlighted in Paragraph 1, referrals were made to the SAPS and the investigations are ongoing in this regard. It should be noted that not all enquiries attended to by the Department results in the Department lodging a criminalcase.

4. The Department was advised by the South African Police Services (SAPS) that DPWI cannot be the complainant since it has never suffered any loss in such instances. SAPS has recommended that the DPWI should rather advise the affected service providers to be the ones who open a CAS with SAPS. The Departmentisthusadvisingallaffectedserviceproviderstoreportthematterattheir

nearest police stations and once the CAS is opened, SAPS normally obtains the affidavits/statements from the Department.

5. The Department has for all eventualities an anti-virus email softwarewhereby:

• the latest Anti-virus software for end point security firewalls isrun;
• all the offices including Regional Offices and sites have firewalls - Virtual Private Network (VPN);
• a Virtual Private Network that ensures all officials logging into the DPWI domain operate in a secureenvironment;

Further to this:

• • TheDepartmenthasamasterICTpolicythatisregularlyreviewedtoaddress all governance and security relatedissues;
  • Active Directory password authentication is designed according topolicy;
  • All systems have current Secure Socket Layer (SSL) certificate to enable encryption, privacy, authentication and dataprivacy.