More questions than answers at mall inquiry

The Tongaat Mall Commission has adjourned until April without hearing from contractor Jay Singh or his son and mall developer Ravi Jagadasan.
Singh was due to testify last Friday, however this was postponed to allow time for Gralio to conduct their own investigation on the site. Last week the three-man commission spent four days interviewing employees of Gralio Precast who were involved in the building of the Tongaat Mall which collapsed on November 19 last year, killing two and injuring 29 construction workers.
The first witness to take the stand was the site foreman, Ronnie Pillay who blamed undersized supporting columns and blatant dismissal of the court order to stop building, for the disaster.
Pillay, who admitted to not being fully qualified to be site foreman, denied any knowledge of the court interdict to stop building, which was issued by the Durban High Court five days before the mall collapsed.
Ismaiel van Zyl, a safety consultant appointed by the contractor Gralio, told the commission that he had never signed off on the removal of any scaffolding or supports.
“I was there the day before the slab gave in and there was no stripping going on, so I do not understand how there could have been people stripping the beams and slab on November 19 when I had not signed off on it,” said Van Zyl.
The inquiry heard from Pillay that some of the form works were being removed on the day the slab collapsed.
Under cross-examination the commission also heard that Pillay had been assigned six safety posts, when the law only allows for a person to hold a maximum of two such posts.
Pillay is expected to be recalled to the stand when the commission reconvenes in April.
Commission chair, Phumudzo Maphaha expressed his shock when Van Zyl said he was not aware of any health and safety audits having been carried out or submitted to the labour department in the four months that he had been appointed as a consultant to the project.
“Most of the witnesses may need to be recalled at a later stage because I for one have too many questions still unanswered. We will spend March collecting more evidence and sending some of it to the labs for testing,” said Maphaha.
Engineers, including those appointed by the Ethekwini Metro, will visit the disaster site on March 10.