Sibusiso Joel "S'bu" Ndebele (born 17 October 1948) is the former Minister of Correctional Services serving from 2012 to 2014. He has been on the

National Executive Committee National Executive Committee is the name of a leadership body in several organizations, mostly political parties: * National Executive Committee of the African National Congress, in South Africa * Australian Labor Party National Executive * Nationa ...

(NEC) of the

African National Congress The African National Congress (ANC) is a Social democracy, social-democratic political party in Republic of South Africa, South Africa. A liberation movement known for its opposition to apartheid, it has governed the country since 1994, when ...

(ANC) since 1997, and was the Provincial Chair of the ANC from 1998 to 2008."Meeting the new Minister of Transport, Minister Ndebele"
''roadsafety.co.za'', 12 May 2009. From 1994 to 2004 he was the MEC for Transport in the government of

KwaZulu-Natal KwaZulu-Natal (, also referred to as KZN and known as "the garden province") is a province of South Africa that was created in 1994 when the Zulu bantustan of KwaZulu ("Place of the Zulu" in Zulu) and Natal Province were merged. It is locate ...

province. From 2004 to 2009 he was the

Premier Premier is a title for the head of government in central governments, state governments and local governments of some countries. A second in command to a premier is designated as a deputy premier. A premier will normally be a head of governm ...

of the

South Africa South Africa, officially the Republic of South Africa (RSA), is the southernmost country in Africa. It is bounded to the south by of coastline that stretch along the South Atlantic and Indian Oceans; to the north by the neighbouring countri ...

n province of KwaZulu-Natal. From 2009 to 2012 he was the national

Minister of Transport A ministry of transport or transportation is a ministry responsible for transportation within a country. It usually is administered by the ''minister for transport''. The term is also sometimes applied to the departments or other government agen ...

Studies

He attended primary school at Makhaseneni, near Melmoth, and matriculated from Eshowe Teachers’ Training and High School in

Eshowe Eshowe is the oldest town of European settlement in Zululand, historically also known as Eziqwaqweni, Ekowe or kwaMondi. Eshowe's name is said to be inspired by the sound of wind blowing through the more than 4 km² of the indigenous Dlinza ...

. He obtained a degree in library science from the

University of Zululand The University of Zululand or UniZulu is the only comprehensive tertiary educational institution north of the Tugela River in KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa. Its new status is in accordance with South Africa's National Plan for Higher Education ...

in 1972, a Bachelor of Arts degree in international politics and African politics from the

University of South Africa The University of South Africa (UNISA), known colloquially as Unisa, is the largest university system in South Africa by enrollment. It attracts a third of all higher education students in South Africa. Through various colleges and affiliates, U ...

in 1983, and an honours degree in development administration and politics in 1985.

Early politics

He was publicity secretary of the

South African Students Organisation The South African Students' Organisation (SASO) was a body of black South African university students who resisted apartheid through non-violent political action. The organisation was formed in 1969 under the leadership of Steve Biko and Barney P ...

at the University of Zululand (1972). Shortly thereafter, in 1974, he joined the African National Congress underground and went into exile in

Swaziland Eswatini ( ; ss, eSwatini ), officially the Kingdom of Eswatini and formerly named Swaziland ( ; officially renamed in 2018), is a landlocked country in Southern Africa. It is bordered by Mozambique to its northeast and South Africa to its no ...

. He was arrested for ANC activities in May 1976 and was sentenced to ten years on

Robben Island Robben Island ( af, Robbeneiland) is an island in Table Bay, 6.9 kilometres (4.3 mi) west of the coast of Bloubergstrand, north of Cape Town, South Africa. It takes its name from the Dutch word for seals (''robben''), hence the Dutch/Afrik ...

in June 1977.

Criticism

Dec 2015 - Durban - Former transport minister S'bu Ndebele has appeared in a Durban court on charges of fraud, corruption and money laundering. Ndebele had been named as the first accused in a corruption, fraud and money-laundering case. He is accused of accepting just over R10m for his direct benefit. Ndebele allegedly accepted the money in order to facilitate tenders worth more than R2bn. Recently he has been heavily criticised for offering 16 500 hectares of land to the Dubai-based company Ruwaad Holdings to build a massive theme park named 'Zulu World'. This will result in the forced eviction of around 10 000 families from the

eMacambini eMacambini is a rural area in the KwaZulu-Natal province of South Africa which is mostly populated by members of the Macambini clan. It is near Mandeni on the Zululand coast, just north of Durban and close to the new King Shaka International Airp ...

clan. The affected community has vowed to resist the evictions and has accused Ndebele of "selling" them to "a new kind of colonialism." On 4 December 2008, the eMacambini community blockaded the N2 and R102 freeways to protest S'bu Ndebele's non-reply to their memorandum handed over in a previous march. On 16 May 2009, shortly after accepting the position of Minister of Transport, Ndebele received a R1,1-million Mercedes Benz S500 from the Vukuzakhe group of 'emerging contractors', who had received contracts worth more than R400-million in the department. Opposition parties have claimed that the gift could be a conflict of interest and that the Mercedes should be returned. Ndebele explained that he received the gift unannounced, long after he had ceased being MEC for transport, and denies any conflict of interest.

Toll Roads

There is not enough money available to fix roads, so more toll gates will probably have to be built on national roads, Transport Minister Sbu Ndebele said in a report on Thursday. More than 4 100 km of roads - or 32 percent of the national road network - are in such a bad state that they only have a "structural life span" of five years left. It would cost more than R35-billion to fix these roads before 2014, Ndebele said in Parliament, according to Beeld newspaper. But his department has only R16,8-billion available to do this.

Departmental Corruption Allegations

The North West government said on Wednesday it had been hit by a multimillion-rand scandal related to road projects that might have been improperly and fraudulently awarded. "I can confirm that a number of contracts issued by the department for several road projects in the province may have been improperly and fraudulently awarded," said Transport MEC Mahlakeng Mahlakeng in a statement. He said it was estimated that more than R1.5 billion allocated for road capital projects over the next three years - the medium term expenditure framework - had already been committed. Within three months of the current financial year, 2009/10, the roads directorate had already spent its entire capital project budget, he said. Its budget allocation for the year was R525 million. He said the information had emerged from an audit by PriceWaterhouseCoopers. The government was committed to getting the money back. Further details would be released once the government had cleared the legal implications of doing so. Millions of rands' worth of contracts had been issued by the department "without following procedure as stipulated by the Public Finance Management Act (PMFA)". The government would give the audit report to the police's Hawks and the Asset Forfeiture Unit to investigate. - credit Sapa Credit: SAPA

References