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The South African Bureau of Standards (SABS) has denied a series of allegations of longstanding and ongoing corruption and mismanagement.

In an open letter sent to Trade, Industry and Competition Minister Parks Tau on December 10, penned by an anonymous whistleblower, the SABS was accused of, among other things, irregular recruitment practices, board dysfunctionality, quashed whistleblower reports, inconsistency in dealing with disciplinary issues and financial misconduct.

Several open letters of this nature have been written to Tau in recent months, with little to no perceived action being taken. The Department of Trade, Industry and Competition has declined to comment on the matters raised by the whistleblower and others.

One of the key issues raised in the latest whistleblower letter was the allegation that questionable bonuses had been paid to executives.

"The very same executives that have been reported via so many whistleblowers have now gone and paid themselves exorbitant bonuses.

"How on earth is this possible when the SABS is literally burning? Further to this, [the acting CEO] has not even completed four months of his term and he believes he needs a bonus. They have been getting acting allowances for years. How is it possible that they can be so greedy?" the author of the letter asks.

However, when Engineering News reached out to the SABS to confirm the bonuses, the bureau denied having paid them, stating "No performance bonuses were paid for executives nor any SABS employees in 2024".

On December 3, Engineering News reported that several SABS executives had been suspended over the past few months and that the bureau had suffered a crippling cyber-attack despite multimillion-rand investments in cybersecurity upgrades.

"[Several executives have been] suspended, the SABS is at a standstill because of a cyberattack, accreditations are being suspended because the SABS is unable to deliver, training services are suspended because the maintenance of facilities is atrocious . . . and the leadership . . . pay themselves a bonus authorised by the board," the whistleblower alleges.

However, the SABS is adamant that the whistleblower has an agenda to discredit the institution and its leadership for an unspecified reason.

"These claims . . . appear to be part of a deliberate effort to misrepresent the organisation and its leadership. After thorough internal reviews, we categorically state that these claims are baseless, lack context and are not supported by any credible evidence. These allegations seem intended to create a false narrative of leadership instability at the SABS," the SABS said in response on December 12.

In a response to the SABS denial, National Assembly MP and Democratic Alliance (DA) Trade, Industry and Competition spokesperson Toby Chance said the bureau's statement raised more questions than it answered.

He said that, among other issues, the cursory statement put out by the SABS did not address the substantive issue raised by the anonymous whistleblower of the suspension of National Education, Health and Allied Workers Union (Nehawu) chairperson Mohola Maremela when he demanded accountability from the acting CEO.

According to the whistleblower letter, the union at the SABS has been very vocal about the alleged corruption and calling for the heads of the executives. However, this has been met with swift reprisal from SABS leadership.

"The SABS has invested more money and resources in trying to find the whistleblowers than in dealing with the allegations of maladministration, corruption, dysfunction or in dealing with the cyberattack.

"The SABS has responded by suspending [Maremela] and threatens employees who speak out. The internal channels for reporting whistleblowing are compromised [and the current executive leadership] squash all legitimate concer...