Calls for Sanral tender awards to be independently investigated

The Organisation Undoing Tax Abuse (Outa) has called on Minister of Transport Barbara Creecy to launch an independent forensic investigation into tender awards by the South African National Roads Agency (Sanral) – or for parliament’s Standing Committee on Public Accounts (Scopa) to conduct an inquiry into the roads agency.

This follows Sanral rejecting suggestions that the findings of its investigation into the R1.57 billion Masekwaspoort tender award warrant a probe into all the tenders it has awarded to the China State Construction and Engineering Corporation (CSCEC).

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CSCEC, in a joint venture with Base Major, was awarded the Masekwaspoort tender.

Sanral’s investigation into the tender award revealed that the tender process was marred by a host of irregularities that collectively undermined the lawfulness, rationality and fairness of the procurement process.

This led to Sanral launching a high court application to review and set aside that award and obtain an order to start the tender afresh.

Outa CEO Wayne Duvenage said Sanral has a massive budget and there are too many concerning decisions that have been taken by it.

CSCEC, which has requested that it be referred to as China State Construction (CSC), said it has chosen not to oppose the Sanral application in the interests of continued positive relations and to avoid lengthy litigation that might further delay the project.

However, CSC said it will clarify its position on certain issues raised in the Sanral application “for the record”.

The Base Major-CSCEC JV submitted six projects in its Masekwaspoort project tender to satisfy the requirement of demonstrating the satisfactory completion of projects of a specified value and scope.

Sanral chair’s sworn affidavit

Sanral chair Themba Mhambi, in a sworn affidavit in support of the high court review application, said none of the projects relied on by CSCEC South Africa were completed by the South African entity itself and the experience cited instead pertained “to related but distinct entities being CSCEC Middle East and CSCEC China”.

Mhambi also stated that:

• “The JV does not appear to be meeting the minimum bid requirements in terms of the key personnel experience and in terms of experience based on the completed projects. These findings were marked ‘high risk’ in terms of execution of the project, within budget and in the required time frames.”

• The Due Diligence report found that the JV “does not have all the resources necessary to carry out the project as prescribed by Sanral”.

• The Due Diligence report concluded that the JV “does not have the technical and managerial abilities required by Sanral to carry out the project of this nature”.

Moneyweb asked Sanral if it will also be investigating the award of the R1.57 billion contract for the upgrade of the R61 from All Saints to Baziya that was awarded to the Base Major-CSCEC JV on 28 November 2024, a day after its award of the Masekwaspoort tender to the same JV.

It further asked Sanral if there was not a need for it to investigate and reevaluate all the contracts awarded recently to the Base Major-CSCEC JV because of the possibility that the issues highlighted in Mhambi’s sworn affidavit also existed at the time other contracts – such as the R1.8 billion Ashburton and R4.3 billion EB Cloete Interchange Improvement projects in 2022 – were awarded to the JV.

Sanral’s response

Sanral media relations manager Lwando Mahlasela said the averments in Mhambi’s affidavit filed in the high court for the Masekwaspoort tender award review application – and any investigations referred to in it that were undertaken by Sanral – “only relate to the award of the improvement of national route 1 section 29 from Masekwaspoort (km 26.50) to km 70.00 awarded to the Base Major-CSCEC joint venture”.

“Your queries fall outside of the above tender and court proceedings and are speculative,” he said.

“Sanral is committed to legality, transparency and fairness.

“Bound by these principles, Sanral will deal with any governance issues relating to tenders and otherwise which may arise in the ordinary course without jeopardising any of its efforts in this regard by providing details to the media.”

‘Outrageous’ response, Sanral ‘hiding something’

Outa’s Duvenage described Sanral’s response as outrageous.

He said the questions are justified and not unreasonable or speculative and were seeking an explanation and clarity on statements made by Mhambi in a sworn affidavit.

He claimed Sanral is not being transparent in its response to questions that require an answer and the roads agency is “hiding something”.

Read:
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“I’m hoping Creecy [Minister of Transport] is asking the questions you are asking and getting to the bottom of it and finding out what is going on – and if they do scratch, they will find a lot more irregularities than these guys [Sanral] want to answer,” he said.

ActionSA wants action

ActionSA parliamentary chief whip Lerato Ngobeni said in a statement released on 13 November 2025 it has submitted a parliamentary question to Creecy seeking clarity on why Sanral and the Department of Transport continue to engage CSCEC and Base Major Construction despite serious allegations against both companies.

Ngobeni said the uMngeni-uThukela Water Board has already initiated a blacklisting process after alleged misrepresentations were discovered in CVs submitted for a 2023 tender by both companies.

“Despite these red flags, Sanral appears to be moving ahead with major contractual engagements involving these companies,” she said.

“ActionSA finds this unacceptable and believes that the public deserves immediate answers.

“It is paramount to establish what the Department and the Minister knew, and when – particularly whether the Minister was aware of the blacklisting process, the full list of existing contracts between the Department, Sanral, and the two companies, and whether any additional contracts with these entities are currently under consideration.

“ActionSA has further asked whether the Minister will place a moratorium on any further contracts until all investigations and blacklisting processes are concluded,” Ngobeni added.

“ActionSA is deeply concerned by what appears to be a disregard for public procurement integrity and the protection of public funds.

“Compromised entities cannot be allowed continued access to multi-million-rand tenders while serious allegations remain unresolved,” she said.

Creecy has not yet responded to ActionSA’s questions.

What China State Construction says

CSC stressed that no adverse findings have been made against the company in any legal forum to date, and that it has a strong track record of delivering value in public infrastructure projects in South Africa.

“As such, CSC is entitled to due process before any purported blacklisting can take place,” it said.

CSC said the allegations raised in a letter from the CEO of Umgeni-Uthukela Water (UUW) were never the reasons given for disqualifying CSC during the tender award process.

“These are new claims which seek to retroactively justify CSC’s disqualification, after CSC took the awarding of the contract on judicial review.

“CSC’s bid was R1.8 billion lower than the bid selected by the CEO, who overruled UUW’s own bid appeal committee after it found in favour of CSC,” it said.

“Since CSC was not awarded the contract there is no question of it benefiting improperly, which is a basic requirement for Treasury to blacklist a company. Nonetheless, CSC will defend these claims if required.”

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