Nelspruit — Mpumalanga reshuffled its cabinet on Sunday in a desperate damage control exercise after three damning corruption reports leaked to the media.

The forensic reports, which have been suppressed since February, detail massive fraud and nepotism within the province's HIV/Aids programmes, hospital tender processes, and daily management of the health department.

Shocked investigators called for immediate criminal charges and restructuring, but Premier Ndaweni Mahlangu sat on all three reports for six months and initially attempted to withhold them from both the Auditor General and the Scorpions, before authorising the panic reshuffle on Sunday.

The reshuffle sees controversial health MEC Sibongile Manana demoted to the toothless sports portfolio, while social services MEC Busi Coleman takes over management of the troubled health department. Current sports MEC, Siphosizwe Masango, moves to social services.

The reshuffle happened so quickly that neither Manana and Coleman were officially informed, and instead learnt about it from the media.

Mahlangu's "clean sweep" fails, however, to address calls for criminal and corruption charges against those implicated in the scandal.

He also fails to tackle evidence that major medical supply companies routinely pay 'commissions' to secure lucrative contracts.

Over 200-pages of detailed evidence against Manana and her health department head Rina Charles includes confirmation that: * Gross mismanagement of Mpumalanga's R19 million HIV/Aids budget includes prima facie evidence of fraud that resulted in wastage on questionable items such as gospel concerts, soccer matches, and a dubious 'cultural village'.

* That Charles allegedly tampered with multi-million rand tenders, failing to disclose that the changes might benefit companies linked to her brother-in-law Percy Siboza.

* That equipment orders for provincial hospitals were deliberately and artificially 'padded', resulting in fruitless expenditure of at least R13,7 million.

* That companies which refused to pay 'commissions' or form joint ventures with Siboza had their contracts frozen or cancelled.

The reports recommended urgent criminal charges against Charles and her chief financial officer, Richard Mnisi, as well as a litany of additional disciplinary charges ranging from dereliction of duty to 'influencing suppliers', and violating financial controls.

PriceWaterhouseCoopers, which probed the bizarre wastage in Mpumalanga's HIV/Aids Home-based Care programmes, also recommends that Manana's role in violating the Financial Management Act be reviewed.

Mahlangu made only fleeting reference to the audit findings in his statement on Sunday.

He instead concentrated on an unrelated eight-page legislature report criticising health standards at provincial hospitals.

"We still believe that our democratic system has dealt us a good hand where personnel [are] concerned, hence the reshuffling of the cards instead of discarding [people]," said Mahlangu.

Insisting that two specially appointed task teams had "looked into" the audit reports, Mahlangu said they had finally drafted an organigram for the chaotic health department, had started addressing the shortage of doctors, had resolved maintenance problems at hospitals, and had negotiated the secondment of specialists to the understaffed Witbank Hospital.

"Having achieved this [I] have decided ... to retire the technical team from Monday," said Mahlangu.

Task team members, including department heads and senior bureaucrats, deny receiving any of the audit reports however, or being asked to probe corruption. The province has also still not provided copies of the reports to the AG, and only supplied copies to the Scorpions after being threatened with a summons.

Provincial director general, Advocate Stanley Soko, was on Sunday unable to explain the apparent suppression, or government's six month delay before acting against Manana and Charles.

He was also unable to say why no criminal charges had been lodged yet.

"These were confidential reports, that we couldn't just publicise and allow people to talk about," said Soko before referring all further questions to Mahlangu.

Mahlangu's spokesman, Sibusiso Shube, insisted he had not been briefed and could not comment.

"I am not in the picture on this. This matter has been kept with the premier himself ... and he will decide when the public needs to know about these issues," said Shube.

Not even Manana has been given access to the audit reports, and eventually had to turn to the media for a copy.

"All I've heard are rumours," she said.

The only person who appears to have received advance warning is Charles, who was informed of the reshuffle at a watershed meeting with Mahlangu on Friday evening. When Charles was told that deputy director general Hussain Verachia was being appointed new head of health, and that she would be transferred to the premier's office, Charles stormed from the meeting crying.

Charles was not available for comment, but correspondence leaked from her Johannesburg attorneys claim she is the victim of a complex conspiracy by Manana and other senior officials.

Her letters, including one to Mpumalanga director general Stanley Soko, also deny any knowledge of kick-backs to Siboza.