Lobby group AfriForum have levelled their sights on the national health department‚ insisting they will lay criminal charges against provincial health administrators.

The group said in a statement on Monday that the move was part of a national campaign against the “misappropriation of taxpayers’ money” in the health sector.

As such‚ charges would be laid against the nine heads of the provincial departments of health in terms of the Public Finance Management Act.

“These nine departments were all guilty of irregular‚ fruitless‚ wasteful and unauthorised expenditure‚ altogether wasting over R10-billion during the 2016/2017 financial year. This information was obtained from the annual reports of the departments.

“The first charges were submitted against the current Gauteng head of the department of health‚ Mkhululi Lukhele‚ who [is alleged to have] misappropriated R1.3-billion in the 2017/2018 financial year‚” the statement read.

Monique Taute‚ for AfriForum‚ described the misuse of taxpayers’ money as a “national crisis”.

“It is time for taxpayers to put pressure on the National Prosecuting Authority to make examples of heads of departments who do not fulfil their duties as prescribed by the Act. They are some of the biggest perpetrators in the misuse of taxpayers’ money‚” she said.