Parliament has appointed a commission to probe financial and governance breakdown of the Ingonyama Trust Board under king Misuzulu kaZwelithini.
Image: Independent Newspapers Archive
Advocate Marumo Moerane SC has been appointed to chair the 11-member commission that will probe the financial and governance affairs of the embattled Ingonyama Trust Board.
There has been uncertainty in the operations of the board since it was sacked by King Misuzulu kaZwelithini, acting as the sole trustee, in December last year..
After dissolving the board, the king appointed Van Rensburg Kruger Rakwena Attorneys to conduct a forensic audit into the financial affairs of the Ingonyama Trust and its board.
However, it is not clear what happened to that investigation because, to date, no findings have been publicised.
On Thursday, Parliament portfolio committee chairperson under the Land Reform Department, Mangaqa Mncwango, said his committee, together with the Land Reform Minister Mzwanele Nyhontso, has appointed a commission that will be led by Advocate Moerane SC to probe the financial and governance breakdown of the board.
“We have approved the appointment of the 11-member commission that will be chaired by Senior Counsel Marumo Moerane. The minister will be in KwaZulu-Natal in two weeks to formally introduce the commission. We want the commission to investigate all the operational affairs of the board,” said Mncwango.
Nyhontso has reportedly briefed the king and the board about the decision. The king and the board were said to have agreed to the commission’s appointment, and it is expected to take six months to finish its work.
Both the king’s spokesperson, Prince Thulani Zulu, and Ingonyama Trust have not yet commented at the time of publication.
Relations between the national government and the king have not been good since the government openly challenged the king’s authority to dissolve the Ingonyama Trust Board, which is a state entity.
Nyhontso publicly rebuked the king for his decision, asserting that it was he, not the king, who had the authority to dissolve the board, rendering the king’s decision illegal.
This angered the king, who, when addressing the opening of the KwaZulu-Natal legislature in February, warned that no minister would control the land of the Zulus during his lifetime.
The king had said that the land under the Ingonyama Trust Board was firmly under his control.
In March, Nyhontso and the king met at Kwakhangelamankengane Palace in Nongoma to resolve their power struggle. After the meeting, the king instructed the minister to appoint a 12-member team to look into the affairs of the board.
He also directed that the committee should include legal experts, traditional leaders, and culture experts.
The minister was further directed to assemble that committee within seven days and report back to the king within a month. However, the committee was not set up.
The Ingonyama Trust Board was established by the KwaZulu-Natal Ingonyama Trust Act 3KZ of 1994 under the then KwaZulu Government. The Trust, which has the king as the sole trustee, manages close to 300 million hectares of land.
willem.phungula@inl.co.za