Qedani Dorothy Mahlangu was born on 12 May 1968 and is a South African politician who served continuously in the Gauteng Executive Council from 2004 to 2017.
31 Facts About Qedani Mahlangu
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Qedani Mahlangu is best known for her tenure as Gauteng's Member of the Executive Council for Health from 2014 to 2017, when she presided over the Life Esidimeni scandal.
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Qedani Mahlangu is a member of the African National Congress and served multiple terms on the party's Provincial Executive Committee in Gauteng.
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Qedani Mahlangu was born on 12 May 1968 in Bethal, a farming town in Mpumalanga, South Africa.
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Qedani Mahlangu was awarded an Honours Degree in Economics from University of the Western Cape.
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Qedani Mahlangu joined the South African Youth Congress in the late 1980s, and subsequently joined the ANC Youth League in the early 1990s.
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Qedani Mahlangu progressed through the ranks of the ANC Youth League in various capacities, from branch to national level.
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Qedani Mahlangu's membership evolved from ANC Youth League to African National Congress full membership in time, and she became a member of parliament in 1998, serving as Gauteng Whip in the National Council of Provinces.
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Qedani Mahlangu has participated in ANC structures in various capacities, including serving as member of the ANC's Provincial Executive Committee in Gauteng since 2002.
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Qedani Mahlangu is listed as Constituency Contact for the Kliptown and Midvaal ANC Constituency Offices in the Gauteng Provincial Legislature.
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Qedani Mahlangu held that position until 2009 under Shilowa and his successor, Paul Mashatile.
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Qedani Mahlangu called for municipalities to cut services to any provincial or national government departments which defaulted on their rates and services.
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Qedani Mahlangu was re-elected to her legislative seat in the 2009 general election and newly elected Premier Nomvula Mokonyane moved her to a new portfolio as MEC for Health and Social Development.
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Qedani Mahlangu Replaced Hlongwa as MEC of Health on 8 May 2009 after the National Elections, as part of Nomvula Mokonyane's first provincial cabinet.
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Shortly after Qedani Mahlangu conducted a review of projects and on 1 July 2009 she wrote a letter to 3P Consulting stating that the department was cancelling the extended agreement.
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Qedani Mahlangu acknowledged she should take some responsibility in the deaths, but refused to admit to any negligence on the part of the hospital or its staff.
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In September 2010, Qedani Mahlangu oversaw the process of closing 3 TB Hospitals in Gauteng Province, namely Charles Hurwitz TB Hospital in Soweto, Tshepong TB Hospital in Tshwane, and East Rand TB Hospital in Ekurhuleni.
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Qedani Mahlangu defended the closure of the Three Gauteng tuberculosis hospitals as necessary to save money and channel resources to where they are needed most, with approximately R3 Million forecast as savings per year.
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Between 2011 and 2013, Qedani Mahlangu worked to introduce a Gauteng Liquor Regulations on Shebeen Licences, into the Gauteng Liquor Act, 2003.
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Qedani Mahlangu fired the board and its chair, Prince Mafojane, in 2012 when they questioned her decision to relocate from Bramley in the north of Johannesburg to the new Department of Economic Development building in Johannesburg City Centre.
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In 2014, Premier Mokonyane, finance MEC Mandla Nkomfe and infrastructure MEC Qedani Mahlangu, were cleared by the Gauteng legislature's privileges and ethics standing committee after the integrity commission investigated allegations of fraudulent expenditure against them.
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Qedani Mahlangu was ordered to pay back the R7309 she used to buy leather goods with her government-issue credit card in Istanbul, Turkey, during a visit in 2013.
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Qedani Mahlangu was re-elected to the provincial legislature in the 2014 general election, ranked ninth on the ANC's party list.
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Qedani Mahlangu was instructed by Premier Makhura to look at a different mechanism of addressing medical negligence cases besides the court processes where the department had lost approximately 168 cases in the same period.
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In 2015, Qedani Mahlangu announced her department's decision to terminate its contract with private hospital group Life Healthcare and its Life Esidimeni psychiatric facilities to save money, as the department was paying R320 per day per patient to Life Esidimeni.
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Qedani Mahlangu encountered huge public opposition, but went ahead with her decision.
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On 13 September 2016, in what later became known as the Life Healthcare Esidimeni Scandal, Qedani Mahlangu disclosed during an oral reply to questions from Jack Bloom, that 36 psychiatric patients that were transferred from Life Healthcare Esidimeni earlier in 2016 had died while in the care of the NGOs.
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Qedani Mahlangu resigned her seat in the Gauteng Provincial Legislature, although she remained a member of the Provincial Executive Committee of the ANC in Gauteng.
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Qedani Mahlangu was not available to testify at the arbitration hearings, apparently because she was writing exams at the London School of Economics, although the university told the Bhekisisa Centre for Health Journalism that no exams were taking place.
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Qedani Mahlangu ultimately appeared to testify in 2018 and disputed the Health Ombud's implication that she had been negligent, arguing that she had been the political head of the Gauteng Department of Health and that it would have been inappropriate for her to intervene in the department's operational activities.
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Qedani Mahlangu is unmarried and has one child, Nkululeko Chris Skhosana who was born in 1996.