WATCH | ANC will act: Mtolo challenges construction mafias to name politicians involved in extortion

ANC KwaZulu-Natal secretary Bheki Mtolo is calling for names and evidence of politicians allegedly involved in the construction mafia syndicate in the province.

This comes after controversial business forum Amadelangokubona leader Bhamuza Mnyandu accused politicians of orchestrating disruption of construction projects in the province.

He claimed mafias were operating with the backing of powerful politicians who benefit financially from the disruptions. “I’m a politician, and there are many politicians, so there must be the name of a specific politician who instructs construction mafias to stop projects,” Mtolo said during a discussion on the debacle on Newzroom Afrika.

“People must say, 'so and so, who’s a politician from this political party, has instructed me to stop this project and demanded so much’, so we can intervene. The police must take the person and get the name of the politician, how much [money] they wanted, and which project they were involved in.”

Mtolo argued that it was unfair to paint all politicians with the same brush, saying “many are innocent and dedicated” to serving the people. If any ANC member is found to be involved in such activities, the party would take swift and decisive action, he said.

“I can assure you, if we discover that one member of the ANC is involved in any criminal activity, we will act. If they are linked, we should deal with criminals as they are, regardless of which party they are associated with.

“Once someone commits a crime, they must be defined as a criminal and treated as such. Once we start to sugarcoat criminals and give them cover-ups, then we will end up not doing what is best for us.”

Last week SABC reported the Amadelangokubona boss linked politicians to the construction mafias.

Amadelangokubona is a group of “tenderpreneurs” who have organised themselves into a forum that demands a 30% share from contractors working for the government and private companies in Durban.

“Government is not approaching us because they also have business interests. They feel that if they call us, we will expose them because they also want these tenders,” Mnyandu said.

“We want the government to engage us on the issue of construction mafias and business forums. There are people from the government who are demanding kickbacks from us. Some want to use us to disrupt projects where they did not gain.”

Public works and infrastructure minister Dean Macpherson had similar sentiments. “There are allegations some political parties are closely linked to these construction mafias and receive funding during election campaigns,” he said previously. 

“It is not hard to imagine how these parties, particularly in KwaZulu-Natal, were funded. They declared no money to the Electoral Commission of South Africa. “The one minute they didn’'t exist, the next minute they were everywhere. They had gazebos, T-shirts and so on. That money didn’t come off of a tree or didn't drop from the sky. It came from criminal networks supporting them to be in power.”

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