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Estate agency board members admit involvement in dodgy deals   Article Date :28 Oct 2005 Mapetla was not prepared to disclose names. Pretoria - Several members of the Estate Agency Affairs Board (EAAB), the statutory consumer protection body of the real estate industry, have admitted to being involved in financial irregularities and are in the process of repaying money to the board. Nomonde Mapetla, the EAAB's chief executive, confirmed this yesterday but was unable to state how much money had to be repaid. "It's not that I don't want to comment on this but it's the [trade and industry] minister's prerogative and out of my hands," she said. Mapetla was not prepared to disclose the names of the five members of the EAAB who had resigned following the forensic audit that was conducted into financial affairs of the board. "They resigned to the minister. The minister will have the names. I'm also not sure when they resigned. Meetings were held following the completion of forensic audit but I was not invited and excluded from these meetings, so I don't really know," she said. Mapetla was unsure whether former EAAB members guilty of financial irregularities would face criminal charges. She said this was one of the available options in terms of the Public Finance Management Act. "Once again this is something the minister will have to decide on. The minister might decide in his wisdom to pardon them. It's up to him," Mapetla said. Astrid Ludin, the deputy director-general for consumer and corporate regulation at the department of trade and industry, confirmed this month the forensic audit report had mentioned irregularities by board members. Ludin said trade and industry minister Mandisi Mpahlwa had convened a meeting with the EAAB board after considering the forensic audit report and asked the board to inform him on how the issues should be addressed. The EAAB board had submitted a report to Mpahlwa, who was seeking his own legal opinion before issuing a statement on how he had decided to address the issue, Ludin said. Business Report reported earlier this month the EAAB was in turmoil amid allegations of financial irregularities and subsequently received a number of calls from estate agents who claimed they had been waiting for up to a year for their fidelity fund certificates, which are effectively their licence to operate as an estate agent. Claims were made that the EAAB board had last met in April, and questions were raised about the legality of the EAAB disciplinary hearing committees, which estate agents said were supposed to be appointed by the EAAB board. However, Mapetla denied these claims, adding that the board had previously comprised 12 members and therefore seven members remained following the resignations. The resignations had not affected the operations of the board because a quorum was six members. She stressed that the appointment of members to disciplinary hearing committees was "a management not a board prerogative". Published on the web by Business Report on October 13, 2005. CLICK HERE TO RETURN TO THE MAIN NEWS PAGE