The Democratic Alliance has laid criminal charges against the province’s Health MEC Nomagugu Simelane-Zulu, for blocking an oversight inspection tour of General Gizenga Memorial Hospital (formerly Stanger Hospital) by DA shadow minister of health Siviwe Gwarube.

According to Gwarube, she and a fellow MP undertook to visit the hospital, including the newly-constructed field hospital, last Tuesday to ensure that the health system was ready as the province braces for a surge in Covid-19 cases.

They were confronted by security and police officers who they say forced them to leave.

Gwarube maintained that MPs were empowered to conduct unannounced oversight inspections at any public institution because of the pressure placed on the system by the pandemic.

She said the DA wrote to Simelane-Zulu and the head of department (HOD) for health last week alerting them to the inspection “as a matter of courtesy”.

“Upon arrival at Stanger Hospital, my colleague, who serves in the Health Portfolio Committee in the KZN legislature, and I were blocked by security and later the police were called to attempt to forcibly remove us from the premises while we waited for hospital management,” said Gwarube.

Gwarube said despite numerous calls to the MEC and HOD explaining the provisions of the Constitution, the rules of Parliament and the importance of oversight work, they were met with antagonism and “misplaced arrogance”.

She said while Simelane-Zulu claimed they were not aware of the oversight visit, hospital management had told her they had received instructions to refuse them entry to the hospital.

“Anyone who responds to calls for accountability in such an abhorrent manner clearly is hiding the true extent of the problem.

“We cannot be in the throes of a global pandemic and still deal with members of the executive who wholly misunderstand the Constitution,” she said.

The hospital made national news in May when it was turned into a quarantine site after 9 mothers, 2 babies, 4 doctors and a nurse tested positive for Covid-19.

Shortly before the closure of the hospital, nursing staff went on strike claiming that not enough had been done to protect them. It later emerged that 42 staff members had tested positive for the virus.

KZN Provincial secretary for Democratic Nursing Organisation of South Africa (DENOSA), Mandla Shabangu told the Courier the union was growing increasingly concerned about the welfare of its members because many hospitals did not have flu clinics to screen patients for Covid-19.

“As far back as March we requested that management need to urgently set up proper temporary structures at hospitals that will serve as flu clinics to help screen patients for Covid-19.

“This will enable patients who come to hospitals with flu-like symptoms to be isolated and tested so nurses and other patients in the hospitals are not compromised. We have only seen two hospitals that have complied with this.

“We are sitting on a ticking time bomb,” said Shabangu.

Gwarube said members of the legislature have long raised the alarm about the state of healthcare in the province but are blocked from exposing the rot.

She said the matter would be reported to health minister Zweli Mkhize and called on Deputy President David Mabuza as the leader of government business to sanction Simelane-Zulu.

“The MEC is not above the Constitution. The DA will conduct these oversight inspections in many of the hotspot areas. It is our Constitutional obligation to ensure that South Africans are being given an adequate health service,” she said.

Meanwhile Simelane-Zulu accused the DA of attempting “to smuggle themselves into the Covid-19 national conversation through the concoction of dubious theories and misinformation”.

She said the department had indicated on numerous occasions that requests for a hospital visit were not tantamount to approval.

“The department has a responsibility to safeguard staff, patients and visitors, and therefore has the prerogative to grant or deny such requests. “

Had the DA done their homework, they might have realised that currently, no visitors are allowed in hospitals.

This is in order to prevent the spread of Covid-19 infections, which may be acquired within a hospital setting or imported by visitors,” said Simelane-Zulu.

The MEC warned the DA against using Covid-19 as a political football and said they need to put aside petty politics and join in the ongoing efforts to strengthen the fight against Covid-19.

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