The team will comprise of various stakeholders including  the Office of the Auditor-General, business, religious sector, labour, community-based organisations, as well as professional bodies such as engineers and accountants.

“It will be critical, as we undertake this work, that all the resources we mobilise are used for their intended purposes and reach the intended recipients. There can be no room for corruption, mismanagement or fraud of any sort. Learning from the experience of the Covid-19 pandemic, we are drawing together various stakeholders to be part of an oversight structure to ensure all funds disbursed to respond to this disaster are properly accounted for and that the state receives value for money,” says Ramaphosa.

Ramaphosa says that the leadership of the Solidarity Fund has acceded to his request to make its capacity available to confront the disaster presented by the floods in KwaZulu-Natal and the Eastern Cape.

Ramaphosa says the Solidarity Fund Board has agreed to assist with humanitarian and other forms of relief in partnership with government, the private sector and various other non-governmental and community-based organisations.

He says the National Treasury will make an initial amount of funds available as part of its efforts to the Solidarity Fund to implement these support measures.

“The Solidarity Fund has effectively managed the resources that government, the private sector and many South Africans made available to them to manage the Covid-19 effort as well as the July 2021 unrest assistance measures. The Fund will now set up a separate bank account for the Flood Disaster. This account can be used by South African and foreign donors who want to contribute to relief efforts. The bank account details will be available during the course of tomorrow on the website of the Solidarity Fund,” says Ramaphosa.

SABC News