Cape Town — The wife of former correctional services minister Ngconde Balfour was not being protected -- even though her renting a luxury golf estate home at taxpayers' expense was not part of a probe into similar actions by correctional services commissioner Xoliswa Sibeko.

Correctional Services Minister Nosiviwe Mapisa-Nqakula , true to her word, returned to a parliamentary committee yesterday to bring MPs up to date on the suspension of Sibeko for renting a luxury property for R35000 a month despite having an official residence at her disposal.

Both yesterday and in an earlier briefing, Mapisa-Nqakula failed to mention Tozama Mqobi-Balfour, commissioner for correctional services in Gauteng, who had rented a property on the same estate while an official residence stood empty.

Democratic Alliance MP James Selfe asked yesterday if it was true that Balfour's approval of Sibeka's and Mqobi-Balfour's rental was not part of the terms of reference of the investigation by Public Service and Administration Minister Richard Baloyi .

Mapisa-Nqakula said this was true, but insisted that this did not mean that the wife of the former minister, now an ambassador-designate, was being protected by the department. She said the acting national commissioner, Jennifer Schreiner, was dealing with the issue of Mqobi- Balfour's golf estate property. She said the fact that Mqobi-Balfour was not suspended at the same time as Sibeko also did not mean that she was being protected.

Mapisa-Nqakula repeated an earlier statement, that the finalised report on Sibeko's case was not favourable to her, but declined to reveal further details as "due process" had to be observed. This involved giving Sibeko an opportunity to respond to the final report. While this had been done, she was unaware of her response, but a deadline of the end of the month had been set for finalising the matter.

MPs from all parties pressed the minister to conclude the matter, with African National Congress committee chairman Vincent Smith saying "we are very eager that this matter is finalised". He said the department was leaderless and the committee wanted stability brought to it .

Mapisa-Nqakula said there were other officials living in rented properties . These officials had been given three months to leave them and move to department houses. The difference between these cases and that of Sibeko was that they were "reasonable" rentals and not "exorbitant".