National rail entity TransNamib is unperturbed by the Leon Jooste-sanctioned investigation into its affairs, saying it is committed to implementing its strategic objectives.
This follows the appointment of audit firm Ernst & Young (EY) to determine the authenticity of allegations of corruption and mismanagement at TransNamib by the public enterprises minister, Jooste, in August.
“As a company, TransNamib’s focus is on implementing our business plan. We have clear-cut direction on what we need to do and that is what we as management and staff of TransNamib are focusing on,” Abigail Raubenheimer, TransNamib’s corporate communications manager told Nampa recently.
The investigation is set to end on 31 October 2021.
Chiefly, EY will investigate alleged transgressions against TransNamib management as well as “allegations of misrepresentation of financial performance and actual progress made around the integrated strategic business plan implementation”.
The audit firm is additionally expected to conduct “an investigation of procurement practices for 2020/21 against the approved procurement plan with specific reference to the leasing of locomotives from third party suppliers and customers”.
The relationship between Namibia Rail Construction (Namrail) and D&M Rail Construction will also be scrutinised.
The minister is also perplexed by how TransNamib’s staff complement ballooned from 900 employees in 2017 to the current 1 400.
“The report that TransNamib in 2017 had 900 employees is incorrect and false. For the past 15 years, TransNamib’s workforce has not totalled less than 1 300,” Raubenheimer dismissed.
She added: “In fact, our workforce in 2017 was more than our current workforce. In August 2017, our employee complement stood at 1 208 (permanent employees) and 61 fixed-term contract employees, whereas our current employee complement consists of 1 208 (permanent employees) and 94 fixed-term contract employees.”
“With the arrival of the current chief executive officer (Johny Smith) to TransNamib, a conscious direction was taken to only recruit critical and key positions. The last mass recruitment that TransNamib has done was in 2018 when we appointed over 100 staff members in the south of the country to support the objectives of the movement of manganese.”
Further justifying the recruitment, she said it was necessitated by the Lüderitz route, which had been closed for more than 18 years before its reopening in 2018.
This route has become a critical commercial route for the company, as from an initial 5 000 tons per month of manganese, “we have moved now to more than 10 000 tons per month and we hope to scale it up to more than 30 000 tons before the end of this year”.
Through re-opening the route, TransNamib has created a much-needed additional revenue source, while also complementing government’s efforts to create more work opportunities in the south, she noted.
In a separate interview last week, Jooste stood by his decision to enlist the services of the EY audit firm.
Source: The Namibia Press Agency
