Cabinet ministers are eating at dining tables that cost more than a small car.
Public works officials have been summoned to tell parliament’s standing committee on public accounts about the hefty prices of furniture used at ministers’ homes.
One invoice, seen by the Sunday Times and sent to public works by Huracãn, the company contracted to supply furniture, includes a R100,800 dining room rug, R25,200 for a child’s bed headboard, four scatter cushions for a child’s bedroom at R861 each, totalling R3,444, and R18,900 for a guest room chair.
Another document, drawn up by officials, gives details of the cost to furnish the main bedroom in a minister’s house in Pretoria. It includes a mahogany dining table for R84,000, 10 dining chairs totalling R157,000, R63,000 for a mahogany king-size bed and R44,100 for two three-drawer mahogany pedestals.
The revelations come after the department admitted to parliament this week it had three houses in Cape Town kitted out with braai areas costing R500,000. Director-general Sam Vukela told Scopa that the department had spent more than R30m in buying five houses.
The houses included one in Pretoria worth R9m. This was in spite of the department having more than 100 other houses in its asset register.
Read the full story in the Sunday Times.
