The assistant director in the Key Accounts Management (KAM) unit would appear again on August 31 as her attorney, Adrian Moodley, requested the adjournment to source documents referred to at the hearing on Wednesday. These documents refer to Phase 2 of the Nkandla upgrades.
Pardesi is one of the 10 public works officials implicated in the controversial R246 million Nkandla upgrades.
She was charged with misconduct for the approval of the tender to the company, and she had pleaded not guilty.
On Thursday, Christian Legwabe, a chief forensic investigator with the Special Investigating Unit finalised his testimony.
Legwabe was part of the team that investigated the upgrades in 2013 and was testifying on behalf of the department.
He had said Pardesi was not supposed to have been part of the Regional Bid Adjudication Committee (RBAC) in June 2010 which signed off on the contract to Money Mine 310 CC for the upgrades.
Pardesi’s boss, Rakesh Dhaniram, had not been available for the committee meeting and had asked her to stand in.
Legwabe also testified that the company was the only one applying for the tender.
“The time required for a proper tender bid is 21 days. In this case, Money Mine was the only company considered for the job. The project did not go out to tender,” he testified.
Legwabe said a negotiated strategy on how to award the tender was discussed as early as March 2009.
The RBAC had ample time to follow proper tender processes, he said.
“In this case only Money Mine was involved in the bidding. This company had built President Zuma’s family house and after he became president, a security assessment was made and they ended up doing the security features.
“Phase one of the project was worth R6.1 million. There was nothing that compelled the RBAC to deviate from the proper tender processes as they had all the time to go for tender,” he said.
“I interviewed Jean Rindel and he is an experienced project manager. He wanted to go for open tender but, for whatever reason, someone must have told him not to. According to Rindel, Money Mine had done work for the president’s family home and when the security risks were identified, the company was also tasked to do the work,” he said.
Legwabe said KAM dealt with the budget of projects and that there were no funds for this project, yet KAM approved it.