The Democratic Alliance (DA) calls on the Minister of Public Service and Administration, Senzo Mchunu, to urgently engage the Companies and Intellectual Property Commission (CIPC) to strengthen mechanisms to prevent public servants from doing business with the State.
While there are currently mechanisms in place to prevent this problem, these have proven to be ill-effective and there seems to be no political will on the part of the Minister and his department to stop this corrupt conduct by government officials.
Currently, the Public Administration Management Regulations Service Code of Conduct seeks to prohibit public servants from doing any form of business with the State. In an effort to enforce this Code of Conduct, the CIPC is available to the Department of Public Service and Administration (DPSA) to identify companies of public servants that are suspected of doing business with the State. The CIPC has partnered with the DPSA, National Treasury, law enforcement agencies and other oversight bodies by providing requested data on an ad hoc basis.
Unfortunately, this process seems to be a classic case of smoke and mirrors as the system is at times highly insufficient. The Companies Act only allows for the CIPC to register Directors and not shareholders. Civil servants can therefore use this loophole to not be traced when unlawfully conducting business with government departments.
As there are no concrete mechanisms in place to prevent public servants from doing business with the State, corrupt officials will continue to use their positions to unduly benefit from government tenders and contracts.
The DA recently revealed that 1 544 public servants have been caught conducting business with the State and while Minister Mchunu has repeatedly made commitments to hold these officials to account – this has not yet happened.
In February 2018, letters were forwarded to various members of the Executive identifying officials within their departments conducting business with the State. On 26 June 2019, the information was sent to South African Police Service and the National Prosecuting Authority to act. In September of the same year, a progress report was sent to the Cabinet.
Last year, SAPS failed to honour an invitation from Parliament’s Portfolio Committee Public Service and Administration to account and give feedback on the list that was sent to them and the status of these cases. SAPS again failed to appear before the Committee last week to give feedback.
This is exactly the lack of political will and accountability that the DA refers to as it relates to holding these dodgy officials to account. If no action is taken, more and more public servants my feel emboldened to use their positions to unlawfully access lucrative government tenders and contracts.
The DA will continue to exercise vigorous oversight of the DPSA, the CIPC and law enforcement agencies to ensure that they investigate and prevent ANC cadres and government officials from looting the State coffers.