DMV & CCB Annual Report 2021/22; with Deputy Minister

Meeting report

CCB's Annual Report and response to AGSA audit outcomes

Mr Calvyn Gilfellan, Chief Executive Officer,  Castle Control Board (CCB), led the CCB presentation on the board's annual performance report, and highlighted several of its achievements. These included:

• A clean Auditor-General of South Africa (AGSA) audit outcome.
• Judicious programmatic spending of the R5.5 million relief funding.
• Due to a gradual increase in tourism business during the year, R3 328 000 in self-generated revenue, compared to R777 000 last year.
• Achieving more than 80% (18 of 21) of their key performance indicators (KPIs).
• Moderate tourist numbers (33 452) to the Castle.
• Ongoing deployment of six regional works unit artisans significantly enhanced maintenance.
• Media coverage reached a global audience of 604.24 million people.
• The Castle sustained 26 full-time jobs and just over 1 000 temporary jobs.
• It has provided opportunities in the film and events sectors.

(See presentation for details)

Discussion

The Chairperson commended the CCB on how it handled state funds and how it had kept the Castle in pristine condition. He had no issue to raise except to thank them for the excellent job and to keep it up. He said the Committee was looking forward to visiting the Castle.

Mr S Marais (DA) also commended the CCB for its great work, and asked it to ensure that the grounds were properly maintained at the entrance to the Castle because it was its window to the outside, and people had to perceive it as positive.

Mr M Shelembe (DA) said it was good to see the entity doing very well. He asked if there were any plans to reach 128 000 people, even though they had had 33 000 visitors. Were there any plans to see their vision or dreams come to fruition? He asked how its relationship with the Department of Defence (DoD) was, and what it was doing to ensure communication between the two Departments. He supported what Mr Marais had said, and added that the Committee needed to visit the Castle.

Mr T Mmutle (ANC) also thanked the CCB for their continued excellent work and for getting a clean audit. He raised a concern on the issue of vacancies, and asked if there was any reason they were losing personnel. What processes were in place to ensure that the vacancies were filled with speed?

CCB's response

Mr Gilfellan said that it was true that the CCB could not have coped with such vacancies were it not for Covid. He said the next board meeting would feature the issue of vacancies high on the agenda. Regarding reaching a target of 120000 visits, he said the CCB was spending only R5 000 on marketing, so if it could raise the marketing funds to R100 000, it could increase its marketing by joining social media campaigns and advertising in magazines. He was also engaged in discussions with Robben Island and the Cableway chief executive officers (CEOs) to see how they could pass on visitors to the Castle. The CCBC had an excellent relationship with the DoD, and the communication was excellent. He appreciated the positive feedback from the Committee.

The Chairperson thanked the Department, and thanked the board for the relief funding during Covid, because it had helped the CCB survive.

Mr Marais suggested that the Committee have one of its meetings in the Castle so the Committee could use the opportunity to see it.

Mr Thabang Makwetla, Deputy Minister of Defence and Military Veterans, described the background of the year under review for the CCB, pointing out that the Covid pandemic had caused a downturn in visitors to the Castle by 250 %. He appreciated its performance, because it had still been able to collect more revenue than had been projected.

Department of Military Veterans Annual Report

Ms Irene Mpolweni, Director-General, Department of Military Veterans (DMV), and Mr Sandisa Siyengo, Chief Director: Research and Development, DMV, led the Department in its presentation, highlighting that the Department had achieved nine out 19 targets. The DMV’s budget was reduced by R50 million, from R654.3 million to R607.3 million, due to budget adjustments across government. The fourth quarter cumulative spending was R515.5 million against a targeted spend of R607.3. R116.3 million (22%) was payment for cost of employment, R241.6 million (47%) was for goods and services, R129 million (25%) was for transfers and subsidies; and R28.4 million (6%) was for capital assets

(See presentation for further details)

Ms Mpolweni added that there were vacant positions in strategic areas. The Department had advertised various posts, such as Chief Director and Deputy Director: Legal. The documents and applications had been compiled and were sitting in the office of the Deputy Minister. The Department had not received any feedback from the office. The Deputy Director applicants for social economic had also been sitting in the office of the Deputy Minister (DM) since 14 June. The papers had gotten lost at some stage, but the Department had resubmitted them on 3 August -- and they went missing again. The Department resubmitted them in September. She was hopeful that the Ministry was going to attend to all the positions since they were critical to delivering benefits such as pensions.

Pensions were also a challenge. The DMV had sent their submissions to the Ministry but had no response. The submission left the office on 11 July, since the Deputy President had already approved the policy on 26 April. The Department had also received the letter of concurrency from Treasury regarding the development of regulations. The Department was waiting for the Ministry to engage it and they wanted the documents to be returned from the Ministry by the end of October, as it needed to prepare for the next processes and fill the vacancies.

Regarding the audit committee, documents had been sent to the office of the DM to assist and to have concurrence, since it was clear that the appointments of the external audit committee had to be dealt with by the DG in concurrence with the Ministry. The documents were still in the office of the DM. The Department was going to have a challenge with its turnaround strategy for the audit.

The Department had received an unqualified audit opinion, and all the audit exercises were indeed carried out internally. The area that had been audited was the Social Economic Support Branch; it received an unqualified audit opinion, with findings in the Zeal healthcare company matter, in which the judgment had been delivered and the resolution had been set aside the previous Friday.

The Chairperson asked for a brief background on the Zeal matter, the court decision and its implications going forward.

Ms Mpolweni explained that it was a matter that involved a tender that had commenced in 2015. The Department had been trying to procure medical services for military veterans through a certain company, but the tendering process did not go well. According to the Public Service Commission (PSC) report, the Department had been asked to withdraw the tender. The Executive and the DM had also asked the Department to withdraw the tender. In that process, there were challenges, and the company had requested a payment which the Department had failed to pay. The company had taken the DMV to court, and the matter had been in court for approximately seven years. The Department had been working with the legal team from the Ministry to assist with the case, because it did not have a legal team at the time. The legal advisor in the office of the Ministry had sent through all the documentation and had gone to defend the matter in court. The Department would be furnished with the formal judgment once it was finalised.

The Chairperson asked about a level 14 senior management service (SMS) member who had not signed a performance contract. He asked if all the personnel had signed performance contracts.

Ms Mpolweni responded that the official who did not sign the performance contract was on suspension, but the other SMS members in the Department had signed the performance agreements with the Minister.

Discussion

Mr Shelembe asked about the military veterans' national database. It appeared that the panel interviewed 1 436 applicants, but 637 did not appear before the panel, and he wanted to know why these 637 did not appear. He was raising this because communication between the DMV and the veterans was very poor. He asked about socio-economic services, stating that the underperformance of R71 million was very worrying, as it affected the provision of houses. When could the Committee expect better performance? What was the Department going to do to address the challenges? He asked why people had resigned from the audit committees. How often did the Department meet with the Advisory Council and Appeals Board? What were the targets to address the challenges regarding the benefits?

Dr M Basopu (ANC) commended the Department for getting an unqualified audit opinion, but the Committee had been hoping for a clean audit. He asked why the Department had achieved only nine targets out of 19, translating to a 49% performance. What were the financial implications? There had been under-spending in the Department, which was contravening the Public Finance Management Act (PFMA). This was not acceptable. What was the problem within the Department in distributing the benefits, and what were the causes?

The Chairperson could not remember when the Department had been able to spend all the money allocated to it. It had been under-spending, especially in Programme Two, which held most of the benefits intended to support the veterans and their dependents in terms of education, health and housing. Despite the veterans' needs, the Department had failed to spend all of the budget. The veterans were living in conditions that required urgent attention. Since 1994, Treasury has been cutting the Department’s budget, which was a problem. Despite the budget cuts, the Department still failed to spend all the allocated funds. The budget was at R600 million, but as reduced as it was, the Department was under-spending by 15%. It was a serious issue that needed urgent attention from the Minister.

The DMV's issues had been raised many times and nothing had changed. Some senior officials remained on suspension, but the annual report showed that there were no disciplinary hearings despite having people staying at home on suspension for almost 170 days, involving four officials and senior managers. Had charges already been referred to them? The Department was spending money on people that remained on suspension and those acting in the positions.

Mr Mmutle asked how far the Department was in terms of addressing the matter of the suspension, since the failure to conclude the matter suggested that it prematurely suspended members and continued to pay without concluding the matter. He asked what the challenge was to resolve the other grievances, since only eight were resolved out of 29. Had the organisation structure been aligned to the current realities so it was able to provide efficient service delivery to military veterans? He asked why the Department had been overspending in one of its programmes -- what was the process it had taken without informing the Committee? He asked for details on the investigations conducted by the Hawks and the Special Investigating Unit (SUI) in the Department.          

DMV's response

Ms Mpolweni responded that she could foresee the under-spending, since all the documents were stuck in the office of the Deputy Minister. If it was unable to unlock the process, it was going to underspend, and the veterans were not going to receive their pensions in the year. The Department needed to be assisted to unlock the processes of the regulations and the pensions. The Department had met with Treasury and the work streams to find out where the blockages on the administrative side were. The regulations requested in the letter of 2 June by the Minister of Finance had been done and packaged, but they were in the Deputy Minister's office. The history was that the Department had budgeted for benefits going through a process of policymaking while the budgets were already in place.

The area of under-spending was in benefits, which the Department was trying to beef up by ensuring the necessary capacity with crucial appointments. It was going to ensure that there were "warm bodies" to do the work. It was an issue to have the budget but not the people to ensure the work was being done. Education was one of the benefits that the Department offered to the military veterans, and it had made a presentation to look at the balance threshold of the one which was an aid to the learners. The Department had presented it to the DM in April with the new policy, and it had concurrency with Treasury on the amounts and the budget. The submission was sent to the Ministry, and she thought Deputy Minister had made a mistake to say it was an ex post facto matter. The DMV had not paid at the new threshold, and time was running out. The Department had all the necessary approvals from the Treasury, and it was waiting for concurrence from the Ministry on the new thresholds. The Department would have paid the schools and allowed the learners to reapply. It had done everything that was required according to Treasury guidelines. She appealed to the Ministry to ensure that it permitted the military veterans to pay within the new threshold. There were unable to ensure that the military veterans who owed fees would be able to pay.

Regarding the database, only a few people had been attended to because the addresses and the cell numbers of the military veterans had changed. The Department had worked through the provinces to contact the veterans and capture the new addresses and telephone numbers. The change in phone numbers also affected the payments, because the bank details also changed.

The underperformance in the delivery of housing to military veterans was because the policy the Department was using was subjecting it to being supported by the Department of Human Settlements. It was a challenge, and it looked at other partnership areas to fast-track the process. Gauteng also changed the model of service delivery. The Department had asked the Treasury to see how it could assist in improving the policy, since the Minister had asked to review the issues that were stopping service delivery.

On the external audit committee resigning, only two members were left. The Department had requested that the members' terms be extended, but the Deputy Minister had not given permission for this. The Department had to start afresh, and that was the process that was also sitting in the office of the Deputy Minister.

She clarified that the officials were suspended due to irregular expenditure. It was not a process that was decided on overnight, but it had been thought through with input from many entities because of the R119 million in irregular expenditure that did not reach the hands of the military veterans, and the R5 million in fruitless expenditure. In the year under review, the Department had not registered any new irregular expenditure and only registered R19 000 in fruitless expenditure.

Mr Siyengo responded regarding the organogram. The Department had been advised to develop an organogram because it could not do it internally for years. It had got experts who were assisted by the Government Technical Advisory Centre (GTAC), and had given a report in August on the macro-organisation structure. The report had been discussed with the management in September for concurrence and agreement, and what was left was dealing with the macro-organisational structure. Before going further, the Department planned to present the report to the executive authority to get further guidance. It also carried out a preliminary costing on what it would cost to amend the structure. It was one of the things that had to be discussed with the Ministry so that they could move to the macro issues such as post and job organisation.

Ms Mpolweni said the DMV had met the advisory council on 11 October, and met with it every month, and the appeals board had not been appointed yet.

The Chairperson asked if there was any reason it had not appointed the appeals board

Ms Mpolweni responded that the Department had advertised the posts, and the processes were underway.

Since everything had been done, Mr Siyengo said the Department was waiting for communication from the Ministry. The Department delivered the curricula vitae (CVs) for the applicants to the Ministry in August.

Ms Mpolweni responded regarding the implications of the under-spending, and highlighted that it was caused by matters that had been budgeted not being implemented due to process issues. She also responded to the issue of suspensions, saying that she did not have the dates, but the cases were in progress.

Mr Mphuti Matli, a DMV official, said the cases of the suspended officials were ongoing -- they were scheduled for the following day, another on Friday, and another on 10 November. The other two had been in session the previous month, and they would be sitting again in December. The reason for the postponement of the cases was that the DMV had challenges with its accounts because most of the presiding officers and the initiators came from outside the province. The problem had been discussed with the DG, and it had been resolved and they were going to make sure that the cases were finalised before the end of the financial year.

Mr Mmutle asked what the responder meant by challenges with the account.

Ms Mpolweni responded that a travel agency was providing the DMV with services and doing the travel-related work of the Department. The account had been blocked, so the Department had to sit down and consolidate the accounts so they could continue with their work. It had done that, and was continuing with its progress.

She was not aware of the investigations by the Hawks and the SUI. The only thing that had been a surprise to the DMV was that during the audit, the Hawks were in the Department overseeing and taking documents and four laptops. The Department had referred the matter to the Minister, since it had seemed very intimidating -- they were taking information that the Department was trying to use for the audit. The Department had made copies, even though it was not informed. It was a strange occurrence that had never been seen before. The matter had been raised with the Minister, and she was trying to find out more.

Further discussion

The Chairperson asked if part of the R208 million in contingent liabilities was related to the Zeal case. He asked if the contingent assets valued at R1.8 million could be unpacked further, and what the financial implications were.

Mr Mmutle asked what had necessitated the overspending by R30 million on steel development, and what the processes were. Had the 19 military veterans registered with the Department of Labour been employed?

Mr Marais asked when the Department would finalise the vacancies so it could deliver its services.

Mr Shelembe referred back to the 637 military veterans who had not come forward to be interviewed by the panel for the national MV database, and suggested working with the municipalities to get notices to the veterans, since local government was the closest sphere to the people. He asked how many applications had been received by the Department, and how many it had failed to respond to within 30-days,as stipulated by the legislation.

DMV's response

Ms Mpolweni appreciated the advice on reaching the veterans through local government channels. Regarding the number of applications, the Department would send a written response. As for the blockage in the applications, it was trying to install and work the Identity Management System (IDMS) project, which had a lot of legs in it -- amongst others, the training of the staff internally as well as empowering the military veterans to update their information on tablets. The Department was working with the State Information Technology Agency (SITA), but it was not providing the services not as fast as required. The Department needed support from the Committee to ensure that SITA was on board to assist the DMV. The digitisation of the processes was going to ensure that military veterans stopped queuing in the offices.

Ms Zintle Gcasamba, Acting Chief Financial Officer, DMV, indicated that virements were the movement of money from one programme to another. The Department had exceeded the budget, but through consultations with National Treasury, it had been able to do virements. She said those were issues raised in the past regarding contingent assets. According to the annual performance plan (APP), the Department had been dealing with cases that were mostly handled by the Office of the State Attorney. These were areas where the Department anticipated that it could recover money. Contingent liabilities related to the Zeal matter, which had been resolved, would impact the quarterly and annual financial statements for 2022/23 since the matter had been resolved in October. She added that the Department did not have material issues regarding its major or minor assets, just issues of monthly reconciliations where the Department had misinterpreted the policies. All the assets had been traced, and they could provide all documentation.

Ms Mpolweni said the Department had taken it upon itself to fill all the vacancies, and had put together an advertisement following the Department of Public Service and Administration's (DPSA's) procedures. The DMV was still waiting for communication from the Ministry.

Deputy Minister's response

Deputy Minister Makwetla said he had raised his hand earlier to intervene before the Committee discussed the report, as the Ministry wanted to make comments. He asserted that the report would not assist the oversight of the Committee because it did not give accurate information about what was going on in the office.

He said the office of the Deputy Minister last had contact with the DMV on 17 June. This was because at the beginning of July, he had written to the DG expressing displeasure with the office of the DG in terms of taking responsibility in the Department. In the letter, it was indicated that there were unprofessional practices that the Ministry was unhappy with. The DG responded to the letter, and she declared a dispute. She had submitted a notification to the office of the DM that she had approached the office of the Public Protector to intervene in adjudicating the dispute. Once the DG had approached Public Protector, he could not continue interacting with her office. The DG had approached the Public Protector on the grounds that were fabricated allegations, and it was clear that the lack of professionalism was not going to make the interaction productive.

He said Members would have noted that in the presentation, the DG had kept referring to the Office of the DM when the office formally withdrew from any interactions. The DG was aware that it was improper for the Department to tell the oversight Committee that their work was in the Office of the DM. There was no such work in the office of the DM. The Minister was dealing with the matter, and they had received interventions in the form of petitions from the management of the Department and the PSA EXCO. The matters were very serious managerial deviations and at the appropriate time, the Minister was going to share with the Committee how it had dealt with the interventions.

He said that the Chief Director, Mr Siyengo, had not assisted the Committee on where the Department was and its challenges. He had said that in the years 2021/22 had been no fruitless or irregular expenditure in the Department. The statement was incorrect, and it was misleading. There were material issues of material and irregular expenditure which led the DM, the Minister and the AG to have a meeting. They had done so because they were not sure if they had sight of the same information on what the Department had been audited on, and what they knew. They had engaged the AGSA to hear why some things had been included and where they were coming from. An example was the fruitless expenditure in terms of the procurement of equipment that had not yet been delivered to the Department in the financial year under review, which had cost the Department between R27m and R29m. The equipment was for the alleged purpose of maintaining roads, which was not work that the DMV did. The equipment had been purchased in the previous year, and was alleged to be sitting in Florida. It was unfortunate that these were the challenges that had to be overcome.

On the appointment of the candidates into senior management positions, he said the adverts for the posts had closed at the end of March, and his office had received the memo of the short-listing only in the previous two months. In their remarks, the DM and the Minister had commented that an inordinate amount of time had elapsed since the closing of the adverts. They had asked why the Department had not proceeded, and how it would know if all the people that had applied were still available to take up the jobs. He believed that for the Department to answer as it did was mischief of the highest order. What compounded the challenge with the DMV was that with the posts remaining vacant, the suspended senior management officials' hearings were far from being concluded. The charges had been finalised in December and January, and the suspension was effected in August. The DG had said the proceedings would stick to the rules and the issues would be dealt with within 60 days. The 60 days had passed and those suspended still had not undergone the hearings. The Ministry did not have a report on what exactly the infringements of the officials were, and they had pleaded for the report for over a year. These were violations of regulations and administrative law. A year later, the information was not in the Ministry. The Ministry was contemplating an intervention to bring the saga to an end as quickly as possible, because the DMV was without senior managers, and it was no surprise that its performance had suffered.

DM Makwetla said some misleading decisions had been presented -- for example, the issue of quantums on education and burials. The memo that the Department had submitted had made it clear that it was of the view that the proposed increases were way above the Department's projected baseline over the medium term expenditure framework (MTEF) period, and that it should not proceed. National Treasury had been clear and mentioned to the Department that according to Treasury, the increases for goods and services in its budget would be 4% in 2022/23 and 4.4% in 2024/25. This was very clear, and the Treasury had indicated that the Department's 8% was way above National Treasury's projected headline consumer price index. This was all in the document that the DG had submitted, and the document included the remarks that the Ministry had made. The Ministry also asked the DG to come with management to present to the Ministry orally. What the Department had reported was not accurate.

Another misleading statement was that the DG had said that the Department would be under-spending because of not paying the military pensions. Members knew that in the financial year, the budget of the MV Department did not include pensions. Treasury had decided to proceed because, in their calculations and study of the Department's spending, there was about R100 million that it had not spent. Under-spending could not be blamed on the pensions because the budget had not included pensions when it was signed off.

Regarding virements, it was disappointing that the Acting CFO had said it was the movement of money between programmes. That was only a half-truth, because there were virements even within the same programmes. The procedure also required the accounting officer to notify the executive authority so that the executive authority could lobby on behalf of the Department. The virements had happened without the knowledge of the Ministry. The DMV was sending the Committee the wrong way. Upon the Minister's return, it would be important to discuss the challenges of the Department so that the Ministry could make a presentation to the Committee.

The Chairperson thanked the DM, and said the Committee would leave the dispute to the executive. It would look at the weak performance of the Department. He wished the challenges would be addressed so that the Department assisted the veterans. He released the DM and the Department.

Discussion on letter from AGSA

The Chairperson said that next on the agenda was the correspondence from the AGSA which he had circulated. He asked for suggestions on what to do with it.

Mr Marais said that the letter should be read in conjunction with the minutes of the 28 September meeting, when they had an interaction with the Auditor-General (AG). The letter confirmed what the Committee had observed during the meeting, and it needed to comply with the AGSA’s request.

The Chairperson asked the AGSA to shed more light on the matter.

Ms Mbali Tsotetsi, Deputy Business Unit Leader, AGSA, said that the letter was one that the AG would send out after the Budgetary Review and Recommendations Report (BRRR), which was used to confirm that the Committee agreed with the recommendations that had been made on 28 September.

The Chairperson asked about the approach the AGSA was adopting, where they would recommend how the legislature carried out its responsibilities. He felt there was a twist in the accountability lines, since the AGSA was accountable to Parliament, and the correspondence felt like the Committee was being held accountable by the AGSA.

Ms Tsotetsi responded that it was not the first time the AGSA had sent out the letter to the Committee -- it did it every year after the BRRR. It was not because the Committee had to report back to the AGSA, but it was in the spirit of the accountability ecosystem to assist the Committee in focusing on some of the matters highlighted concerning the portfolio.

The Chairperson asked if the AGSA was reminding the Committee of its responsibility.

Ms Tsotetsi said the AGSA highlighted specific concerns so that it brought these areas to the attention of the Committee, so it could hold the Department accountable.

The Chairperson said the legislature had given the AGSA sufficient teeth to bite if the accounting officers failed in their duties concerning the audit queries. The AGSA had to make the accounting officer directly responsible. The change was to ensure that the AGSA did not come to the legislature, because it had enough tools to get the necessary action from the accounting officer.

Mr Marais said that he could not recall if the Department had ever received a letter in that specific format, and indeed the questions were relevant. Was the letter indicating that the AGSA wanted the Committee to act more strongly? Did it want Parliament to take specific actions against the officials?

The Chairperson asked what more the Committee could do if they raised an issue, and there was no action taken on it?

Ms Tsotetsi agreed that it was true that the amendment had given the AGSA more power to deal with the accounting officers. With the Department of Defence, the challenges were unique, because the AGSA could not take further action against the military command because of the stipulations in the Defence Act. The AGSA had also highlighted the issue of the accountability framework of the Department of Defence and indicated that the issues were unique, and had therefore brought it to the attention of the Committee so it could assist in dealing with the Department by calling the executive authority to indicate what it had done in trying to resolve the issues causing the backlogs in terms of material irregularities. The AGSA emphasised that the Committee had to ensure accountability from the Department and the executive. It had been put in writing just to remind the Committee that these were the issues the AGSA was very concerned about in the particular portfolio.

The Chairperson said the Committee had raised the issue about the material irregularities in the Department many times, as well as the issues of slow consequence management. The Minister was aware of the issues, and she had been there during the discussions. She had instructed the Chief of the Defence Force to act, and she had said she did not think that the Secretary for Defence (SecDef) had exhausted everything within her power to get the Chief of the Defence Force to act on the issue of irregular expenditure. It had reached the stage where the situation could not be taken beyond a certain point, and he had shared the letter with the DM and the SecDef. He asked if the AGSA had written to the SecDef and the DM to hold their Department accountable.

Ms Tsotetsi said the AGSA would send a letter just to highlight the issues they were concerned about. It was busy preparing a status record review that was going to highlight all the gaps in the DoD and the DMV. It would discuss these with the accounting officer, and it was going to receive commitments from them. After those engagements, the AGSA would take it a step further to circulate the briefings to the Minister, where it would try to source commitment.

The Chairperson said it had raised the issue so many times and he was now asking out of frustration, because nothing had changed even after asking about the issues on a public platform.

Mr Marais shared the concerns of the Chairperson, and said the Committee had to bring it into their programme so that the Ministers and the accounting officers could come and explain what they were doing to address the issues.

The Chairperson said he thought the letter was saying that they had to do what was expected of them, but it reminded the Committee to keep pushing, and he accepted it in that spirit. The AGSA was aware of what the Committee was doing because it attended most of the meetings, even the meeting that the Committee had closed to secure commitment, but no progress had been made. He asked the AGSA to take the matters to a logical conclusion regarding the powers given. The SecDef was the accounting authority, regardless of the setup in the Department, and she had to come to state what steps she had taken. He was not satisfied that that had happened. He asked the AGSA to apply the full measures of the Act. The AGSA had to raise the certificate of debt.

Mr Marais supported the idea.

The Chairperson deferred the consideration of minutes to the next meeting.

The meeting was adjourned.