Part One: Dipuo Peters ‘Pays Back the Money’ 

Last week, Dipuo Peters paid almost R190K in legal costs to #UNITEBEHIND. Legal costs are the expenses a court orders one party to pay after losing a case. They usually include attorneys’ fees, advocates’ fees, filing costs, and sheriff’s fees. In simple terms: when you lose in court, you may be ordered to pay for the other side’s fight.

WHY DID THIS HAPPEN? 

In late 2022, #UniteBehind had laid formal complaints against Dipuo Peters – who was the Minister of Transport between 2013-2017 – as well as 5 other politicians who were members of parliament at the time. 

During this period – the so-called ‘Zondo-era’ of State Capture –  PRASA was looted, mismanaged and destroyed from within. Senior executives, members of parliament and white-collar business interests were accused of manipulating procurement, sidelining oversight, and awarding irregular contracts worth billions of rands. 

Key systems were collapsing: trains were being taken out of service, maintenance was neglected, security failures increased cable theft and vandalism, and commuter services deteriorated sharply. Millions of working-class South Africans faced closed stations, cancellations, delays, overcrowding and unsafe stations. The loss of reliable transport had caused economic damage to the commuters, business and country as a whole. 

The Minister of Transport has constitutional and statutory duties to ensure that public entities in the transport sector are properly governed, accountable, and serve the public interest. In other words, they play a big role in ensuring that state owned entities, such as PRASA are held accountable to the public. The Minister is responsible for political oversight of PRASA, appointing boards through lawful processes, and ensuring passenger rail services are safe, effective, and financially sound.

WHAT DID DIPUO PETERS DO? 

Through investigations from Thuli Madonsela’s Derailed Report, the Zondo Commission, as well as #UniteBehind’s own research along with leaked whistleblower reports, it was alleged that during her time as minister of transport Dipuo Peters: 

• Failed to appoint a permanent Group CEO at PRASA.
  • This mattered because PRASA was left without stable executive leadership during a crisis period. Without accountable leadership, corruption and dysfunction were allowed to deepen.

• She dismissed Popo Molefe’s Board after it uncovered R14-billion in irregular expenditure
  • Her decision was later overturned by the High Court, which found her actions irrational, unreasonable, and unlawful. 
  • Peters also attempted to stop the Molefe Board from investigating corruption at PRASA.
    
    
• Zondo’s State Capture Commission Report criticised Peters for not addressing corruption within public entities.
  • It accused her of improperly using PRASA’s infrastructure and assets to benefit the ANC without following proper payment or procurement processes.

WHEN PARLIAMENT FAILS, WE FIX PARLIAMENT!

After we had lodged formal complaints against Dipuo Peters and 5 other MPs, parliament had failed to act. The body of government, which is supposed to be accountable to us, had not responded, so we had to act. In April 2023, #UniteBehind took Parliament’s ethics committee to court for failing to act on the complaints and for changing its code of conduct to allow for those implicated in corruption to walk away. After this, Parliament’s Joint Committee on Ethics and Members’ Interests  (committee of parliament whose job it is to hold other MPs to account) found that Peters had breached the Code of Conduct. She was sanctioned and suspended for one parliamentary term.  

END OF THE LINE

Not willing to accept the outcome, she challenged this decision in court in January 2024. However, her application was dismissed. The Court ordered that Peters pay the legal costs of #UniteBehind and the Speaker of the National Assembly, which had both opposed her application.

Peters did not pay.

#UniteBehind’s attorneys later sent a letter of demand. Repeated attempts to contact Peters and her attorneys reportedly failed. With no payment forthcoming, the sheriff was instructed and her Mazda CX-5 was identified for attachment.

Following a three-hour engagement with the sheriff at her premises, Peters agreed to pay the full amount owed.

UNFINISHED BUSINESS

Although R190 000  is a large sum of money for a small civil society organisation – and the average South African – it is nothing compared to the corruption, and mismanagement at PRASA. 

The Zondo Commission estimated that billions of rands were lost through state capture and corruption across state entities, with PRASA among the major sites of abuse. Separate PRASA scandals alone ran into multi-billion rand contracts and losses

This was our money. It was meant to maintain our trains, improve our stations, expand services, and provide affordable transport for all people.

Instead, you and I paid the price with unsafe stations, broken trains, delays, overcrowding, and lost opportunities. 

Even though the trains are now back and running, with the continued corruption at PRASA, and lack of accountability for those already found guilty – where do we draw the line before our state entities are destroyed again? 

Should we allow Dipuo Peters to still serve in government?

After being found guilty of breaching Parliament’s Code of Conduct, Dipuo Peters now serves as Speaker of the Sol Plaatje Municipality Council in Kimberley.

As Speaker, her responsibilities include overseeing the municipal council — the law-making and oversight body of the Sol Plaatje Municipality in Kimberley – A municipal council which has been deemed a ‘big whole of municipal failure’  

Recently, Dipuo Peters has alleged to have been “disregarding council rules and regulations”. The question remains: should we allow this to continue?