The board and executive committee of the Development Bank of Southern Africa (DBSA) on Tuesday noted their concern over the “unfounded allegations contained in a Daily Maverick article of August 11.

The DBSA strongly contested the allegations in the article, saying these were based on inaccurate information and assumptions that could not go unchallenged.

The article alleged that PRASA acting CE Nkosinathi Sishi had “unilaterally and secretly” negotiated an agreement that allowed the DBSA “to extract management fees in excess of R400-million for proposing and developing infrastructure projects for PRASA.”

The DBSA had held meetings with the Passenger Rail Agency of South Africa (PRASA) and reiterated a point made in an emailed response to the Daily Maverick on August 8 that no written draft agreement had been considered nor had any agreement been reached.

“Both PRASA and the DBSA are Public Finance Management Act- (PFMA-) listed entities and organs of State, to whom Section 239 of the Constitution applies. 

“In terms of the framework provided by the National Treasury’s Standard for Infrastructure Procurement and Delivery Management, State organs can enter into service delivery agreements to implement projects on behalf of each other,” the DBSA indicated.

The DBSA noted that its competence as an implementing agent was also questioned in the article.

“The DBSA is a development finance institution and an organ of State, operating across the whole infrastructure value chain. In addition to financing, we offer planning, project preparation, as well as infrastructure delivery and implementation support through the Bank’s Infrastructure Delivery Division, which was established in 2013 and has since implemented over R15-billion of projects on behalf of various organs of State.

“The bank’s Infrastructure Delivery Division is solely on a cost recovery basis hence the bank makes no profit out of being an implementing agent,” it said.

The DBSA emphasised that it had zero tolerance for corruption and said “suggestions to the contrary without proper evidence are irresponsible”.