Pretoria - Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries Minister Tina Joemat-Pettersson is considering instituting disciplinary proceedings against senior officials for misleading her and Parliament about her hotel accommodation.
This comes as her department provided Parliament with incorrect information last month when responding to a question about the minister's accommodation in both Pretoria and Cape Town since her appointment in 2009.
The reply was tabled in Parliament on Monday.
The entries provided by the department were about meetings that Joemat-Pettersson held in hotels with stakeholders over the past two-and-a-half years, where refreshments and food was served.
In a statement, spokesperson Selby Bokaba explained that the minister did not sleep in any of those hotels.
Joemat-Pettersson said: "The senior officials in the department must take full responsibility for the wrong information provided to my office to answer the parliamentary questions on this matter. Disciplinary action will be taken against those officials who gave me incorrect information."
The misinformation had given her an incorrect reputation.
"As a result of this bungle, I have now been cast as an extravagant minister who willy-nilly splurges on luxury using taxpayers' money, and has scant regard for the millions of South Africans who live in abject poverty."
Bokaba said when Joemat-Pettersson was appointed minister; she relocated from Kimberly in the Northern Cape to hotels in Pretoria and Cape Town because the Department of Public Works did not have houses for her.
"Since there was no proper official accommodation for her, she had to leave her children in Kimberley with family members as she is a single mother," he said.
He further said she was allocated an official house at Groote Schuur Estate, Cape Town, by the Department of Public Works in July 2009.
"She immediately assumed occupancy of that house, despite the house having chronic defects which included broken toilets, bathrooms and a roof that threatened to collapse. She could not relocate her children because the house was dilapidated, but she nevertheless stayed in that house." he said.
During that period, Bokaba said the Department of Public Works had promised to renovate the house, but by January 2010 the house had still not been renovated.
After a freak accident in the kitchen floor, the minister was instructed by the Department of Public Works to move out of the house and relocate to a hotel because the house had become unsafe for human habitation.
However, she refused to move to a hotel and continued living in the house until she was able to move to a rented house in September 2010.
"The Department of Public Works refused to help her with furniture and other necessary household goods. She was even denied domestic help which she is entitled to as a minister. She still lives in the rented house.
"If the minister had followed the instruction of the Department of Public Works to relocate to a hotel while they were mulling over renovating the house, she would have spent an extra full year in a hotel with her children.
"Instead, she chose to rent a house which until the beginning of October she paid for, and still battles to this day to reclaim some of her expenses," Bokaba explained.
Earlier this month, the Department of Public Works officials went to view the house, by which time she had already fixed a lot of defects out of her own pocket.
"I paid for electricity, water, garden and pool services for the whole year out of my own pocket and had to claim the expenses I incurred from my Department, certain claims of which they have refused to pay," said Joemat-Pettersson.
Bokaba said the minister stayed in a hotel once after being allocated official housing when she hosted the Vulnerable Workers' Summit in Somerset West.
The minister initially stayed in a hotel before moving to guest houses when it became apparent that the Department of Public Works was in no rush to provide her with a house in Pretoria.
Joemat-Pettersson assumed occupancy in the house identified by her officials in August 2010, to date.
"Ever since I was allocated official accommodation in Pretoria I have never stayed in a hotel," she said.
