Bhisho’s rental bill spirals as office park plans stall
THE Eastern Cape government will spend R281-million leasing office space over the next financial year starting next month.
This is an increase of more than R30-million from the R248-million spent in the year ending this month.
This was revealed by premier Phumulo Masualle during a reply to a question in the Bhisho legislature.
ANC MPL Mzoleli Mrara asked the question, saying he was concerned over the lack of stateowned buildings in the province to house government departments. Masualle last week told the house the provincial government continued to fork out on leasing offices.
Asked for a progress update on the much talked about Bhisho Office Park plans, Masualle said bids had been put out for either public or private partnership and investment, but all were “unresponsive”.
“We have since, with national Treasury, come to agree that we should pursue the matter further, particularly looking at those in the investment environment, the public investment commission being one of them,” he said.
“This [is] to see whether there could not have been a failure in that open process [we previously took] to instead go for limited interaction on the best possible way to fund that initiative.
“That is the progress in respect of the Bhisho Office Park.”
A Dispatch investigation in 2016 uncovered that 19 state entities in the province lease property from SKG, an East London-based company owned by property mogul Jean du Plessis.
Then, the Eastern Cape Liquor Board was paying R180 000 a month to occupy SKG’s Beacon Bay Crossing complex office space.
Mayibuye Transport Corporation was also using the same offices for an undisclosed rental amount.
Other state entities leasing office space from SKG included:
● The Eastern Cape Land Claims Commission which moved into Beacon Bay Crossing on October 2016 for an undisclosed rental;
● The Eastern Cape Parks and Tourism Agency also moved into the SKG-owned building in the East London CBD for a monthly rental of R428 361.54 in 2016;
● The department of human settlements, as at 2016, was paying a monthly rent of R1.8-million for its Chiselhurst office;
● Eastern Cape Rural Development Agency paid about R9million a year in rent for its Beacon Bay Crossing office;
● ADM said it paid R1.2-million a month for the state-of-the-art glass office, also in Chiselhurst; and
● The department of environmental affairs, department of energy, the Commission for Gender Equality, Independent Police Investigative Directorate, SARS, the Hawks and Home Affairs are some of the other entities that lease through SKG.