What R700 billion lost to corruption means

About R700 billion has been lost over the past twenty years due to corruption. John G I Clarke

This is according to the Institute of Internal Auditors.

The latest estimate for the cost of Medupi is R105 billion – so without corruption we’d have had enough money not to have a power crisis.

Recently a solar computer lab was put together at Umhloti Primary School in KwaZulu Natal.

According to the group behind the project, each lab would retail at about R450 million.

Without corruption 1,555 schools could have solar computer labs.

Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan in his 2014 budget speech said R70 billion was spent over five years contributing to the construction of 590,000 houses.

Corruption cost us the equivalent of 5,900,000 houses. We could have built houses for over 10% of our population of 52.98 million.

Also in the 2014 budget - R8.8-billion assigned to the NSFAS. Would the University of Witwatersrand have hit the same problems with SASCO if that fund had an extra R35 billion added to it?

The cost of the Gauteng freeway upgrade is around R20.5 billion to construct according to high court filings.*

I think it is safe to say that without corruption, the people of Guateng wouldn’t have to pay for e-tolls.

Where else could we get the money do all of this stuff? How about by that most radical of methods called “being honest.”

The old saying goes that it is very cold outside the ANC, as Cosatu president Sidumo Dlamini warned last year – but isn’t that more of an indictment of the ruling party than anything else?

Corruption isn’t just a by-product; it is the binding agent the ANC relied on to try and keep its allies from splitting.

And it is costing us as a country. It is costing us houses for our homeless, it is costing us electricity for our industries, it is costing us computers for our pupils, it is costing us our roads and it is “very cold outside the ANC.”

*Correction: Originally I had written that the cost was R17.9 billion according to Outa. John G I Clarke, spokesman for Outa got ahold of me and supplied the corrected information, and the court documents the new figure comes from (Page 22, the first point on the review grounds).

I apologise for doubting them, Outa has shown great integrity here.