Committee Report on appointment of IPID Executive Director

Meeting report

Committee Report on the appointment of the Executive Director of IPID

The Chairperson gave a recap of the current situation. She stressed that the necessity for the amendment of the IPID Act has become more acute. The current IPID Act does not give the Committee the sole responsibility to appoint the IPID head. The Committee did not want a repeat of the appointment process that occurred. The Committee must be given the opportunity to do interviews. The Committee must be involved in the appointment of the IPID head and have an opportunity to review the CVs of the candidates as well. The Committee had unanimously agreed that the IPID Act must be amended. The amendment should particularly focus on the manner in which the IPID head is appointed. The shortlisted candidates are not interviewed by the Committee. The general perception in the public is that when the Committee appoints an IPID head it would be doing interviews as the other Committees do when they have to appoint a candidate. Mr Terblanche and Dr Groenewald spoke about the Committee needing to have criteria and a process that has to be set. She requested that this be prioritised in the amendment of the Act. The Committee has done what it was expected to do.

The Chairperson then moved onto the matter of the vetting of the candidate. All the documents were ATCed two weeks before the Committee made the appointment. All the documents, the shortlisting and the CVs, were made public. The members were given a chance to comment before the adoption of the report.

Mr O Terblanche (DA) said that the process needed to be reviewed. The Act must be urgently amended. He was not happy with the process that was followed. It was not a proper process.

Dr P Groenewald (FF+) disagreed with the Chairperson’s comment that the Act should be amended to allow the Portfolio Committee to have interviews. According to the rules of Parliament, the Committee already has the power to hold interviews with the candidates in the interest of making the best decision possible. The Committee could then have created its own criteria. The Committee already has those powers. Since the Act was being amended it should be included in the amendment so that there was more clarity.

Dr Groenewald pointed out that the CV he received of the successful candidate only showed her employment status up until April 2017. According to that CV, she has been unemployed for the past three years. He cannot see what she has been doing since April 2017 according to the CV. It was urgent that the Committee amend the Act. The Committee has already approved the candidate and he objected to that. He welcomed the fact that the Chairperson said the amendment of the IPID Act needed to be sped up. He hoped that the amendment would happen as soon as possible.

Ms P Faku (ANC) agreed with the remarks made by the Chairperson. The Committee agreed that the IPID Act needed to be amended. She said that members cannot make statements that were not addressed previously. It was important that when an appointment process starts the Committee lay out all the requirements. Dr Groenewald’s suggestion that the Committee should have been given an opportunity should have been stated upfront. The process is over so the members cannot raise such issues. The amendment of the Act needs to take into account the court rulings.

The Chairperson was concerned because all the relevant documents were sent to the members beforehand and they were asked to raise any concerns about the process. The members cannot come in the middle of the process and revise the criteria that has been used. The process needed to be revised before the actual appointment. The only person who sent the Chairperson correspondence was Mr Whitfield. Mr Whitfield sent a letter and she addressed his concerns. She had asked the members to raise their concerns before the Committee dealt with the appointment of the candidate. The members were given an opportunity to raise their concerns. She hoped during the amendment of the IPID Act the members would be forthright about the shortcomings of the appointment process. There was a draft amendment of the Act. She would ask the Minister of Police to take that draft Act and show it to the necessary Committees in the Cabinet.

Dr Groenewald said that the Committee, according to the rules of Parliament, may compile its own amendment Bill. The Committee could allow the Minster to come forward but he was worried that that process would take a long time. It should be put on record that the Committee stresses the urgency to the Minister to complete the amendment. If it takes too long, then the Committee should begin the process of drafting an amendment. Any Member of Parliament can come forward with a Bill. The rules also make provision for the Committee to also formulate its own amendment Bill. He suggested that if the Minister took too long that the Committee start its own process.

The Chairperson said that when Mr Whitfield suggested that the appointment of the IPID head only be made after the amendment of the Act her office immediately started the process of drafting an IPID Amendment Bill. She had already seen the first draft of the amendment Act. That was the type of urgency with which she has considered the matter. She would be following the amendment process with clear and specific timeframes. She would not even consider the amendment process taking another year.

Mr Terblanche said that Mr Whitfield was almost ready with his Private Member’s Bill and he would submit that to Parliament shortly.

Ms J Mofokeng (ANC) agreed with the members and said that the Committee should commit itself to timeframes. The Committee should say that within the next five or six months the amendment should be tabled.

The Chairperson agreed with Ms Mofokeng. The Chairperson went through the draft report on the appointment of the Executive Director of IPID. She asked for any amendments.

Mr Terblanche had an amendment with regards to the lack of experience of the candidate that was appointed. He was the one to raise the matter and that was not properly captured. He also raised the point that other candidates were disqualified from the appointment process due to the very same issue. He thought it was important that this should be in the report.

Mr K Maphatsoe (ANC) did not understand the amendment that Mr Terblanche was raising and asked for clarity.

The Chairperson explained that Mr Terblanche’s comment on the experience of the candidate was not included in the report. She requested that addition be made and that the report be corrected. It should be noted that other candidates have considerably more experience.

Mr Terblanche agreed that was exactly what he had tried to convey.

Ms Mofokeng said that it was a suggestion and that it should not be included in the report. The Chairperson should see if the other members agree.

The Chairperson asked if the members were happy to include the amendment into the report.

Ms Mofokeng was not happy with the amendment being included into the report. The candidates had been for interviews and the suitable candidate has been appointed. She did not think it made sense for that amendment to be included into the report. The report was about the candidate that had been appointed as an IPID Executive Director. If any members wanted to raise any concerns it can be raised in a debate. She did not think the comment was not necessary and appropriate for this report.

The Chairperson asked the Secretariat to take the Committee through that point in the report. The issue was raised and captured in the report. It stated that the Democratic Alliance was not happy with the appointment due to the candidate not having investigative experience. She asked if Mr Terblanche was happy with how it was captured in the report.

Mr Terblanche was not happy with how it was captured. He said that it was not the party that raised that issue. It was he who had raised that issue. He did not get the credit for mentioning that issue and that was quite important. Secondly, the other candidates who did not have the same experience were not allowed to be shortlisted for that very reason. The candidate without this experience was still appointed. He wanted that to be captured.

Ms Faku was not sure what Mr Terblanche was raising because he represents the Democratic Alliance. It was not necessary to capture his name in the report because he represents his party. She agreed with Ms Mofokeng’s remarks. A report was just a summary of what had happened. It was not necessary to right every single thing down.

Mr Maphatsoe said that the report was presented to the Committee and they had engaged with the report on the candidates. Reasons were explained why the other candidates were not appointed. He was not sure whether Mr Terblanche did his own investigations to come to the conclusion that the candidate did not have experience. What does he mean by experience? There are different types of experience. He said that Dr Groenewald was raising relevant issues with regards to the report but Mr Terblanche was trying to politicise the situation. The candidates went through the same process. He did not think Mr Terblanche’s amendment should be included in the report.

The Chairperson said the Committee was not going to reopen the discussion of the appointment of the candidate. In the report the Committee did not usually mention the names of the individual members but parties instead.

Mr Terblanche said that he was not reopening any debate. He was discussing what was in the report. If the report did not mention any names, then why was Dr Groenewald mentioned in this report? The Committee needed to be consistent. This report does not properly reflect his contribution. He would be happy if all the names would be taken away and the report only refers to political parties.

Dr Groenewald said that with respect to Mr Terblanche it was not necessary to become childish. His name was not mentioned in the report. The report refers to the Freedom Front Plus and not Dr Groenewald. He was proud to represent the Freedom Front Plus. If Mr Terblanche wanted credit he needed to raise it with the Democratic Alliance. The Committee was wasting time. The amendment that Dr Groenewald wanted to propose was on the second paragraph of page two. It should be added that the Freedom Front Plus also objected to the matter that the Committee had no opportunity to interview candidates to decide on who the best candidate is. Rule 166 of the National Assembly says if a report is not a unanimous report it must specify in which respect there was no consensus. In addition to the views expressed by the majority it must express the views of the minority in the Committee. According to rule 166 there was no consensus on the report.

Ms Faku had a problem with coming to the end of a process and then having requirements about the process. What Dr Groenewald was raising about the candidates being interviewed by the Committee was not initially a requirement and should not be included after the process has been completed.

The Chairperson said that Dr Groenewald was correct. If there were two opposing views both views needed to be recorded in the report. The Chairperson asked that those two opposing views be recorded. The one view speaks about the experience and the other view disagrees with that. The disagreement does not change the content of the meeting but it notes the difference the members had on that particular matter. She asked that concerns raised by the FF+ and the Democratic Alliance be noted.

Ms Z Majozi (IFP) asked that the Committee focus on the report. Any suggestions should be dealt with in the next meeting or when the Committee met to discuss the IPID Act. Bringing up new suggestions did not help the Committee.

The Chairperson said the discussion was now over. The Committee was not going to reopen the debate on the appointment. The matter that she wanted to focus on was if there were any additions to the report. If any members had any further corrections, they should raise it.

Mr Terblanche raised an objection that the report was not a true reflection of what he said in that meeting.

Ms Mofokeng said that Dr Groenewald was correct to say that Mr Terblanche was being childish. She thought it should be enough that the report captured what the Democratic Alliance said and not what the individual said. The IPID Act will be debated at another stage. She then moved for the adoption of the report.

The Chairperson stressed that a report does not give a verbatim analysis of what each and every members has said. The members were not included in the report as an individual. The members were included in the report under their respective parties.

Ms N Peacock (ANC) seconded the adoption of the report.

The report was adopted (by the majority) with amendments.

The meeting was adjourned.