The DA intends hauling Minister for Women, Children and People with Disabilities Lulu Xingwana to the SA Human Rights Commission to answer for her department's alleged financial mismanagement.
The department, with an annual budget of more than R140-million, has been dogged by controversy about its poor performance since its inception in 2009.
Lindiwe Mazibuko, the DA parliamentary leader, revealed her party's submission to the commission yesterday. She claimed the department has done nothing concrete to uplift South Africa's disabled.
"We are calling on the commission to conduct an in-depth investigation into the financial mismanagement and misappropriation of funds allocated to the Rights of People with Disabilities programme within the department, as well as its general inability to deliver on its mandate," said Mazibuko.
In its submission to the commission, the DA said the department had never been given a clean audit. Unauthorised expenditure was listed at R6-million and it had apparently spent 93% of its 2011-2012 budget on salaries.
DA spokesman Helen Lamoela slammed the department's "failure" as "tantamount to a violation of the rights of South Africans with disabilities".
Phuti Mabelebele, the spokesman for the department, said Xingwana will respond today to the DA's allegations after studying the submission to the Human Rights Commission.
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