The DA in KZN has accused Premier Sihle Zikalala of lying about the cost of vehicles for the Zulu queens, adding that his office actually overspent on national government prescripts for them.

A TimesLIVE report says the provincial government in December delivered five vehicles for the late King Goodwill Zwelithini’s wives, including one for the Queen Mother, Mavis MaZungu.

Zikalala emphasised at the time that the purchase was in line with policy that ‘for political office bearers you don’t buy a car that costs more than R800 000 and therefore each of the cars here are below that amount’.

However, in a written parliamentary reply to the DA, the Premier revealed that only one vehicle – a Toyota Fortuner – was purchased in line with national government prescripts, at a cost of R673 000.

Zikalala said at the time the six vehicles were bought for less than R800 000 each.

However, five of the six cars – Toyota Prados – were purchased for more than R1m each, R200 000 more than the national government prescripts on each vehicle.

According to his parliamentary reply about the cost, the total budget for the six cars – R5m – was overspent by R695 467,’ said DA chief whip Zwakele Mncwango.

The DA said it would submit a parliamentary question to the Treasury to establish if it had approved the amount spent.

Full TimesLIVE report