Transport Minister Joe Maswanganyi defended the Passenger Rail Agency of SA’s (Prasa) interim board before Parliament’s portfolio committee on transport on Tuesday, and signaled that he would be closing in on the Werksmans Attorneys probe into corruption there. Prasa was the worst-performing parastatal in the 2015-16 financial year and the agency was unable to table its 2016-17 annual report to Parliament ahead of the late September deadline. The absence of Prasa’s board at the meeting — with the exception of the minister, a shareholder representative — irked committee members. Werksmans was appointed to investigate the scale of mismanagement unearthed in former public protector Thuli Madonsela’s report, Derailed. The firm has since gotten R150m and National Treasury is now investigating 130 contracts worth a minimum of R10m. However, the internal dynamics at the agency soon came to the fore when the minister responded to questions from the committee’s members, who used to be his co...
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