Scarcely hours after President Ramaphosa announced his new measures to address corruption related to the spending of Covid-19 relief funds, OUTA began to receive requests from the public to ensure that those responsible for corruption and the maladministration of these funds be held accountable, and that all investigations must be transparent.  

The Special Investigating Unit (SIU) has been given authority to investigate any state institution in connection with corruption or misuse of state funds relating to the Covid-19 national state of disaster.

OUTA is now asking the public to come forward with evidence and details relating to corrupt use of Covid-19 relief funds and resources through our confidential and secure whistleblowing platform. We will work with the SIU and the Auditor-General to ensure that all hard and fast cases are followed up, and we will track the progress of each case to make sure perpetrators are held to account.

We urge anyone who knows of or has strong evidence of corruption to come forward and provide us with the information. The OUTA whistleblowing portal provides for anonymous reporting. The more detail we get, the stronger the cases will be. 

• OUTA has written the President to inform him of our whistleblowing efforts to address the corrupt use of Covid-19 relief funds, as well as to request that more funds are allocated to the National Prosecuting Authority and other law enforcement processes, with a view to beef up resources during this period of heightened corruption that is clearly taking place during emergency spending activity. Accordingly, we received a positive response from the Presidency acknowledging our effort and call for more resources to tackle the problem of corruption during these times.