Mr Dube, the company’s van driver until a few years ago, does nothing but sign a wad of blank cheques once a month — a job that he describes as “boring and tiring”.

On most days, he sits in his new office and plays computer games. “I love cards, particularly solitaire,” he says.

Mr Dube, a father-of-three without his own bank account, had to be shown how to sign the cheques by his former white employers, now his “partners”. He also regularly signs tender documents for “his” Durban-based IT company.

“I am the only one who can sign things you see,” he says, “but sometimes I do it from the van.”

Mr Dube, who has no birth certificate but thinks that he is 42, is a blatant example of a new South African business practice called “fronting”.

This involves white-owned companies promoting one of their former black employees, often from a lowly position, to director level. Then the person fronts the company, enabling it to portray itself as a black firm and receive favourable treatment when government tenders are handed out.

Under controversial Black Economic Empowerment (BEE) legislation, adopted in 2003 to try to speed up the slow pace of change in South Africa, companies who employ people termed the “previously disadvantaged” can expect favourable treatment. Another recent case of fronting involved a white businesswoman’s maid and her daughter who were made co-directors of her construction company.

Mr Dube, an illiterate black South African who was robbed of an education by apartheid, quite likes his new job. His salary has trebled from 2,000 rands (£180) to 6,000 rands a month and his fellow directors are building him a home so that he can move out of his one-room tin shack in the city squatter settlement of Mayville.

He says: “I have a telephone and a big desk. I am called director and logistics manager — I don’t know what that means. I sometimes go to meetings, but I don’t say anything. I do not take part.”

His fortunes began to change about four years ago, when his employers at Corporate Network Systems (CNS) told him that he was going to become a co-director of a new company known as Collaborative and Knowledge Business Systems (CKB).

“They told me apartheid was now over and black people had to be bosses and that I was going to be a boss, too. I was very happy,” Mr Dube said. His employers bought him a suit and tie and even took him along to business meetings.

Without realising it, Mr Dube helped CKB — a small business run by a white couple — to win a lucrative contract from Durban City Council worth five million rands to install and then run a paperless document management system. Much more business was promised if the deal worked out.

However, Mike Sutcliffe, the city manager, became suspicious when Mr Dube did not attend many meetings between the municipality and the company. When he did, he just sat there and did not contribute.

An investigation ordered by Mr Sutcliffe quickly concluded that CKB was a black-owned front for CNS. The contract was cancelled.

“It was one of the most blatant and offensive cases we have come across. It is a total betrayal of the democratic process, and one of the worst forms of corruption in the country today,” Mr Sutcliffe said.

The council had tightened up its procedures for vetting firms trying to procure business using BEE legislation. CKB, however, is still doing business. It responded by appealing the council’s suspension of the contract and even tendered for a follow-up contract of some 15 million rands. It said that it was training Mr Dube.

The company declined to comment yesterday. When The Times visited the offices in the upmarket suburb of Kloof, it was informed that all senior staff were in meetings and not available.

Ten years after the collapse of apartheid, the white minority still control some 90 per cent of South Africa’s economy.

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