While Mpumalanga Premier Mandla Ndlovu’s office has been criticised for unlawfully awarding lucrative IT and legal services contract, the high court in Mbombela has ruled that the companies involved must still be paid millions of rand for services they rendered in good faith.
Acting Judge Kgama Shai, delivering a scathing judgment on Friday, found that the Office of the Premier blatantly ignored procurement regulations when it appointed CAJV (Pty) Ltd and iFirm Trading and Projects (Pty) Ltd under tenders issued in 2014 and 2018.
This was well before current premier Ndlovu took over the reins of the provincial government.
The judgment reveals that it was Ndlovu’s administration that sought to scrap the contracts inked during the tenure of former premiers Refilwe Mtshweni-Tsipane and the late David Mabuza.
Mabuza, who died early this month, signed off on the initial contracts before being elevated to national office as deputy president in 2018. Mtshweni-Tsipane then presided over the extensions, as she remained in power until June 2024.
Sophisticated procurement
The tenders were issued for a sophisticated Case Information and Investigation Management System (CiiMS), a digital tool intended to help provincial departments monitor, track, and manage legal cases efficiently.
In 2015, CAJV was appointed to roll out the system in partnership with Online Intelligence (Pty) Ltd, while Adendorff Theron Inc handled legal services under the same contract.
However, by 2016, the Auditor-General raised a red flag: the province was paying for a system it did not even own.
This led to secretive negotiations for the outright purchase of CiiMS—without any open tender process. Judge Shai found this deeply problematic.
“The decision to acquire the system… without going out on an open tender was irregular and amounted to an illegality.”
Contracts extended
Despite the red flags, the premier’s office extended the contract and even authorised further payments.
Legal advice later obtained by Ndlovu’s administration confirmed that the contracts were unlawful.
The premier’s office then launched a self-review application, hoping the court would invalidate the contracts and relieve it of payment obligations.
But judge Shai would not have it.
“Organs of state should not be encouraged to, and cannot, avoid their contractual obligations… I see no reason why [the respondents] should forfeit all payments related to the faithfully rendered services.”
Inflated prices
He said the service providers had delivered in good faith, and the province had directly benefited from their work. However, the court did draw the line at inflated invoices submitted by CAJV.
“Payments of rendered legal services should be limited to invoices or bills provided by the attorney, not the marked-up amounts billed by the first respondent,” he ruled.
In a blistering critique of how the original contracts were designed, Shai said: “I fail to understand how an organ of state could have designed a tender/contract that invited other service providers to contract through a back door.”
The court ordered that an independent auditor be appointed to determine whether the province overpaid for CiiMS or other services.
Any excess must be refunded; if underpaid, the premier’s office must settle the difference.
Ultimately, the premier’s office was slapped with the bill for all legal costs.
“It is the conduct of the functionaries of the applicant that brought about the illegality complained of,” said the judge.
The ruling lays bare a long trail of irregular governance—and exposes an uncomfortable truth: even attempts to clean house can still cost the taxpayer dearly.
