Covid-19 corruption: First NPA drops charges, now, 3 years on, department hearings drag on

Three years after they were implicated in a R4.9 million Covid-19 corruption scandal involving blankets meant for the poor, three chief directors in the KwaZulu-Natal Department of Social Development are yet to account fully before a disciplinary inquiry, News24 understands.

In April, the department put all its suspensions, including the three senior managers, on hold and instructed the employees to return to work "as part of a broader government decision to ensure timely and efficient finalisation of all disciplinary hearings", in line with a provincial government circular on 6 February 2023.

The circular requested all departments to review all current precautionary suspension cases, pushing all departments to ensure that employees were "gainfully employed while finalisation of their cases was still pending".