Afrikaanse Taal Monument and William Humphreys Art Gallery: 2021/22 annual reports; with Deputy Minister

Meeting report

Afrikaanse Taal Monument Annual Report 2021/22

Overview

Mr Vusithemba Ndima, Acting Director-General, Department of Sport, Arts and Culture (DSAC), told the Committee that the Afrikaanse Taal Museum (ATM) and Monument derive its mandate from the Cultural Institutions Act of 1998. It is mandated to:

Maintain the ATM’s cultural-historical buildings and heritage sites and the heritage of Afrikaans in such a manner that nation-building and social cohesion will be achieved;

Collect and conserve, conduct research on, and portray, through exhibitions, the origin, development, benefit and expansion of Afrikaans, with a special focus on inclusiveness to address historical imbalances;

Promote and stimulate Afrikaans nationwide at all levels of society, especially in disadvantaged communities, by means of lectures and publications, educational programmes, guided tours and cultural activities.

The ATM made good progress in financial management by moving from qualified audit reports in the preceding two years to an unqualified audit report in the financial period currently under review.

The composition of the board was well representative of diverse ethnic groups and gender.

ATM annual report

Mr Michael Jonas, Director, Afrikaanse Taal Museum and Monument, told the Committee that the ATM is a museum and monument that portrays the establishment and development of Afrikaans. It has
an amphitheatre where 4 200 patrons can enjoy shows and it is located at Paarl, Western Cape.

It is governed by a non-executive council of independent members appointed by the Minister, broadly representative of all South Africans.

He said the ATM's vision was to expand into a dynamic and inclusive institution that promoted the linguistic diversity of Afrikaans within the context of a multicultural society.

The ATM faced numerous challenges, including financial sustainability, repairs and maintenance on buildings, security for public sites and municipal expenses.

It had various income-generating activities such as events and courses, commercial photoshoots and filming, providing function and conference venues and rental of the amphitheatre.

Regarding their performance, visitors were down by 48 percent compared to pre-covid times. The ATM received most of its funding by means of subsidy allocations from the National Department of Sport, Arts and Culture. Donations and sponsorships for public programmes generated R383 185. Total revenue for the year increased by 26 percent to R16 529 505, of which government contributed 85 percent. The expenditure for the year under review was R14 406 047, an increase of 14 percent from the previous year. This was due to operations starting to revert to normal after easing Covid-19 restrictions.

Investments showed an increase from R9 585 328 to R13 124 268. The ATM received funding for capital works which could not be spent by year-end and was invested for the interim.

The Auditor-General issued an unqualified and clean audit opinion for the 2021/2022 financial year. The Auditor-General also commended the ATM for not having to make any significant changes to its financial statements after they were submitted on 31 May 2022.

See presentation for further details

William Humphreys Art Gallery Annual Report 2021/22

Overview  

Mr Ndima told the Committee that in terms of the Cultural Institutions Act of 1998, the William Humphreys Art Gallery (WHAG)  operates as a state-owned entity under the DSAC. Its mandate is to collect, preserve, research and exhibit works of art which represent the artistic heritage of all South Africans. It must utilise its assets for the edification, enrichment, and enjoyment of the people.

The WHAG received unqualified audit reports without findings for the past two years.

No challenges were encountered by the WHAG which needed the Department’s intervention.

WHAG annual report

Ms Martha Ramafalo, Chief Financial Officer (CFO), WHAG, said their mission was to collect, preserve and conserve artworks that represented the cultural diversity and heritage of South Africa, Africa and beyond.

Exhibitions were at the core of the Gallery’s mandate. In the year under review, the institution successfully met its target by hosting ten exhibitions of art both on temporary loan and permanently curated at the Gallery.

Two accountants were appointed on a  contract basis to assist with all administrative matters including financial accounting and reporting, audit facilitation, supply chain management and reporting. This was a temporary measure to remedy staff shortages in the administration section. This led to achieving an unqualified audit report without findings and exceeding targeted output.

The underutilisation of the budget for collection management was largely due to donations of artworks from artists and production houses.

Due to financial constraints, the museum relied heavily on partnerships to realise outcomes and free up funds to service escalating costs in other areas of the entity’s budget.

Ms Ramafalo said the building housing the Gallery was slowly deteriorating. The heating, ventilation and air conditioning (HVAC) system needed attention as it was not fully functional and was last upgraded in November 2014. The Gallery received a grant allocation from DSAC to upgrade the HVAC system that was responsible for climate control within the Gallery. Due to the large scope of this upgrade project, and the lack of required skills within the institution, the implementation of the capital investment required a tender process to be followed to appoint a project manager. The appointment of the project manager is currently in progress.

See presentation for further details

Discussion

Mr M Zondi (ANC) asked for clarity on why staff left the ATM.

He also asked whether the South African Museum of Literature and the ATM had any working relationship. If they did, what joint programmes would be implemented by those two entities in the current financial year?

Ms R Adams (ANC) asked the WHAG what services were rendered for the R1 million classified as consulting fees in the notes to the financial statements.
She noted that the entity spent R257 000 on local travel and subsistence in the year under review and before Covid-19, it spent R269 000. She asked how extensive the entity’s outreach programme was.

She asked what relationship the ATC had with the Pan South African Language Board (PanSALB). 

The ATM received an allocation of R500 000 in the previous financial year through the Presidential Employment Stimulus Programme (PESP). What was achieved using these funds?

Mr D Joseph (DA) said the ATM had been mandated to promote the Afrikaans language. He asked what progress had been made. 

He congratulated the ATM on its clean audit. He noted racial inclusivity in the senior and junior staff levels.

He asked whether the ATM was able to benchmark itself against other languages and against the Constitution regarding language promotion. If the ATM had established itself so well, how did that benefit other languages or did all the attention and recognition go to the ATM only?

Regarding self-generated funding, photo shooting should be a profitable venture. Were the ATM capitalising on that?

He sought clarity on whether the R2 million savings came from unspent grants and funds, as allocated funds should be spent.

He asked whether attention was given to the Arabic Afrikaans of the historical Bo-Kaap area in Cape Town. 

What was meant by the statement that the monument was on indigenous land?
 
He commented that the ATM was declared a public entity in 1977. However, the slides did not detail what happened in 1994 and how or why an entity for the Afrikaans language was where it is today. The ATM should not shy away from discussing critical matters like change in South Africa.

Ms D Sibiya (ANC) asked whether the ATM employed any people living with disabilities and, if not, what it was doing to address this weakness.

She asked whether there were plans to recover the R9.6 million in irregular expenditure. What caused the over-expenditure on public programmes, communication, and research?

What partnership did the ATM have with small enterprises?

Mr B Madlingozi (EFF) commented that there were Afrikaans speaking ethnic groups that were racist and racially looking out for themselves. Institutions like the ATM, with a focus on the Afrikaans language, raised a danger of creating racial spaces even in institutions of higher learning. This resulted in unsettling occurrences in these institutions. He asked for the ATM’s thoughts on these actions that were working against social cohesion. Was the ATM  aware that it being a standalone museum worked against social cohesion? Why was the DSAC supporting separate development by supporting an entity that sought to promote its own language? He seconded Mr Joseph’s questions about other languages. He asked why other black languages still had not been recognised since white settlers from the West occupied South Africa.

The Chairperson asked the ATM for its perspective on matters related to continued development of monuments. She asked for the view of the ATM on establishing linguistic museums for all languages.

She asked whether the entity’s revenue generation was impacted by loadshedding challenges.

ATM responses

The ATM’s director, Mr Jonas, said staff members left the ATM for better job opportunities. One staff member did not complete a probation period.

There was a difference between language and literary museums. However, the ATM would collaborate on projects to promote reading in different languages across the country.

The ATM had engagements with PanSALB’s chairman and provincial leadership. The ATM was looking at possible collaborations as it believed it could contribute significantly to indigenous language promotion. Indigenous languages could contribute to the Afrikaans language too.

Regarding the question about stimulus funding, they never received the grant money, so they were unable to report an outcome from this.

The strategy they had adopted to promote the Afrikaans language was to look at the marginalised dialects of Afrikaans, like Cape Afrikaans and Muslim Afrikaans, and conduct lectures and educational programmes. The ATM wrote newspaper articles and hosted lectures engaging issues around language.

Mr Jonas said he did not recall stating that the monument was on indigenous land. However, the ATM promoted indigenous knowledge systems through exhibitions. One of the latest focused on medicinal plants and how this living heritage and knowledge was transferred from one generation to another.

Regarding benchmarking against other languages, he responded that it was difficult because Afrikaans was in a privileged position. Within a hundred years, it moved from what was known as ‘kitchen Dutch’ to an academic language. In terms of progressive thinking, the Afrikaans world had much to offer in supporting indigenous languages to be elevated to academic languages.

The  ATM benchmarked its tariffs for commercial shoots against local, national tourist basic, and provincial tariffs. This has made ATM tariffs market-related and competitive.

The Bo-Kaap Museum was a satellite of Iziko Museums of Cape Town. The ATM had contact with them when it presented an annual Arabic Afrikaans workshop where people got the opportunity to learn about the language and how to translate Afrikaans to Arabic and vice versa.

He acknowledged that the Afrikaans language had lots of historical baggage which must be part of its historical narrative.

Ms Shandry de Jager, Financial Officer, ATM, said the unspent savings related to funds moved from the cheque account to an investment account. It had to be classified under underspending in investments and also as an unspent grant under current liabilities in the financial statements.

Mr Jonas said persons living with disabilities were part of their recruitment agenda. However, in the six years he worked at the ATM, he had never seen this particular demographic applying for positions.

Ms de Jager said the irregular expenditure was related to overspending on public programmes. There was a plan for addressing irregular expenditure that investigated what had happened. That plan had a time frame for holding people accountable. Sometimes the overspending resulted from underbudgeting in a particular area which the organisation tried to rectify in the financial plans for the following year. Sometimes certain programmes had no marketing budget and when the entity looked at ticket sales, they had to spend money on marketing in order for an event not to go into deficit.

Ms Sibongile Tsoleli, Deputy Chairperson, ATM, responded on the inclusion of other languages. She said the mandate of the ATM was very clear about promoting Afrikaans. The institution was established as a cultural institution under the DSAC. If the mandate was to be changed, the DSAC and Parliament would have to instruct the ATM to do so, as the current mandate of ATM was governed by an Act. The ATM council had discussed this matter at its meetings, but no conclusions had been reached. More time was needed for research on which languages could be included and promoted within the demographics present around the museum.

The PanSALB was mandated to promote all the indigenous languages in South Africa. The ATM had a relationship with PanSALB, but they would take note of all the comments raised by Members about strengthening the relationship they had with other cultural institutions that shared the same mandate as them.

Mr Lionel Adendorf, Council Member, ATM, referred to the politicisation of Afrikaans and misconceptions about the language. Afrikaans was his mother tongue and also the language that his children spoke. The ATM’s position had always been clear that Afrikaans had never been a white man’s language and had never been a coloniser’s language. The history of Afrikaans had black origins and was very African. That was why the ATM Council fought perceptions that were different. The Council was committed to ensuring that the Afrikaans language as a construct remained inclusive. This was evidenced in the programmes implemented by the ATM to ensure that all Afrikaans-speaking people, both black and white, were comfortable in Afrikaans, claimed it as their own language and that stigmas and wrong and negative perceptions were dealt with efficiently and effectively.

The ATM was very sympathetic to those who felt they had become estranged from Afrikaans. They were largely in the black community and believed Afrikaans to be their mother tongue but seemed to be estranged from the language. The ATM’s mandate was to ensure that more black Afrikaans-speaking people, in particular, were comfortable and found resonance and a home in the language. That was why the organisation was working hard to deal with the negative perceptions. There were hostage situations where some organisations and groupings wanted to claim Afrikaans as their own. This was also a battle the ATM was fighting.

The ATM would continue to use Afrikaans as a means to build South Africa and to ensure that each and every person who spoke Afrikaans and who loved Afrikaans found they had a place in the country.

Further discussion

Mr Joseph suggested that Mr Jonas should listen to the recording of the meeting. He would clearly hear that he mentioned the ATM being on indigenous land.

He said Mr Jonas had described Afrikaans as a language of the oppressor and the oppressed. Mr Adendorf had then mentioned that Afrikaans must not be politicised. This was contradictory. The ATM was aware that it was a debatable point, given the history of the country. Mr Adendorf’s statements about who he was, board members being liberal and so on were all political statements. Mr Adendorf could not start political discourse and expect Members not to address the politics of Afrikaans.

Ms Sibiya said she would like to encourage the ATM to promote the importance of symbolism, music, and monuments in order to educate communities and school learners.

She also suggested they develop a recovery plan to restore pre-pandemic levels of attendance.

Ms Adams asked for the view of the board on using museums for all languages.

She further asked what constraints the ATM had in restoring performance to pre-pandemic levels.

Mr Zondi asked which symbols and collections the ATM had that represented the cultural and multilingual interconnections of Afrikaans beyond educational programmes and cultural activities.

He also asked how the ATM could communicate the significance of monuments, given the experience of the national flag project.

He asked what partnerships the ATM had with small enterprises.

Ms V Van Dyk (DA) asked how many other language monuments, besides the ATM, the department had established or contributed towards establishing or intended to establish in future to celebrate other indigenous languages.

She asked how the Department would assist in addressing service delivery challenges at the ATM.

She asked what relationship the ATM had with the PanSALB. It was strange that when there was an outcry for the monument’s name to change, there was no reflection of the PanSALB’s views.

Responses

The deputy chairperson, Ms Tsoleli, acknowledged all the recommendations made by the Committee and said they would be discussed at the next council meeting. The next time they appeared before the Committee, they would report on the work the ATM was doing to promote who they were as South Africans.

Mr Adendorf placed on record that the ATM was committed to a transformation agenda. It was sometimes difficult as some political parties attended community meetings to interrogate the ATM, but the ATM responded appropriately.

The ATM had a relationship with Afrikaans academic institutions and hosted various community activities, for example, book launches, to show the council’s regard for Afrikaans.

There were many challenges that the ATM needed to overcome. However, progress was being made, which would be communicated at the next meeting.

DSAC responses

The Acting DG, Mr Ndima, made a correction. The presentations referred to the Department of Arts and Culture. However, that changed with the addition of “Sport” to the Department’s name.

Regarding Mr Madlingozi’s comment that the DASC was funding separate development, he said there used to be a National English Literary Museum in Makanda and today it was the Amazwi South African Museum of Literature. You could have one museum servicing literature from different languages. South Africa was not a stagnant society, it was evolving, and thinking changed accordingly. The Department was in the process of amalgamating various entities and no one could know what the future held as far as museums and language were concerned.

Given current budgetary constraints, he responded that having a monument for every language was not something the Department could contemplate. The Department perhaps needed to look at how it integrated instead of separating.

Ms Tsoleli extended an invitation to the Deputy Minister and Committee Members to visit the museum in Paarl.

Discussion: William Humphreys Art Gallery

Mr Zondi noted that the WHAG underspent by R500 000. He asked why it did not use its budget to increase its impact on artists. The entity reported financial constraints in Programme 3, but it underspent in the same programme by over R650 000. 

Note 27 to the financial statements related to litigation involving the former director at the CCMA, which gave a ruling in favour of the Gallery. The case had been referred to the labour court for review and the timing and amount of contingent liability were uncertain. In another note to the 2020/21 financials, the entity stated that it was not worth mentioning that there had been a change in leadership at the Gallery as the director, Ms White, was on maternity leave from April to July 2020 with the CFO, Ms Martha Ramafalo, acting in the position in the interim. Subsequent to the suspension and litigation message, Ms White’s contract was terminated, with Ms Ramafalo remaining in the acting position for the duration of the financial year. He said the Gallery further noted in the 2021/22 annual report that in order to alleviate the administrative burden due to the CEO vacancy, the WHAG started outsourcing to service providers at a cost to the organisation. He asked what led to the process of Ms White ultimately being fired, how long the process took and how much it cost the entity. Why had the Department not seconded a CEO from one of its other entities to assist the WHAG during this period?

He commented that the WHAG underspent on its collection management by R1.5 million. Why did it not convert these funds to acquire more artwork from emerging artists who barely made it after the COVID-19 pandemic?

Mr Joseph commended the WHAG for a clean audit. He asked for a breakdown of the consulting fees.

He requested that the entity put in writing the information requested by Mr Zondi regarding the dismissal of Ms White, as those costs were quite sizeable, especially as they did not know the direction in which the case would go. Did they have a budget to cover litigation fees?

Reference was made to outsourced functions and, in particular, a project manager. What was the scope and cost of this appointment?

He stated that a plan to keep employee costs below 60 percent was alarming. Government should think about setting percentages and what must be included in those percentages to regulate staff costs. More money should go to services for people.

Ms Adams asked whether the Gallery had a strategy to attract donations and other finances to expand the amount of artwork acquired to promote previously disadvantaged, emerging and established artists.

She asked what criteria the Gallery used to set performance targets seeing as it overachieved on most of the output indicators in Programme 2.

She asked how the Gallery would promote digitised artwork beyond the website. She recommended they develop a digital strategy to promote the artwork domestically and internationally.

Ms Sibiya asked what happened during the course of the initial planning of the HVAC project, as the WHAG had indicated that the project could not be implemented sooner due to capacity constraints. Could they not foresee this challenge?

The Chairperson asked why the WHAG had underspent by R2.4 million. Why did they not appoint finance officials to provide financial management functions, including procurement? Did the CFO have any plans to build an internal finance capacity?

She asked what type of partnerships the Gallery had with creative artists.

WHAG Responses

Mr Popo Masilo, Chairperson, WHAG Council, said the matter of the former director started with an anonymous tip-off given to Mr Masilo telephonically by one of the staff members. The staff member alerted him that there had been a change of entities and accounting systems without the approval of the council. This unauthorised change in the system was apparently initiated by the former CFO together with the internal audit representative. The accounting firm, Morar Incorporated, had deployed a representative named Schalk Oosthuizen to do the internal audit function. This individual, together with the CFO, decided on a new accounting package system. The system was operating for six months without the council’s knowledge. When the council started investigating, they uncovered many material irregularities, including an existing relationship between the service provider and the internal audit representative, even to the extent that the payment made on the entity’s behalf to the new service provider was made by the internal representative. The council then had a meeting with the executive and Morar Incorporated about this conduct. Morar conducted their own investigation, and all allegations were found to be true. The WHAG was reimbursed all monies spent on behalf of the entity.

Another incident was the appointment of a particular law firm by this representative and the same CFO to conduct the council’s strategic workshop. After investigation, it was found that the appointment of the law firm was irregular. Disciplinary action needed to be taken after these investigations and when they began, the CFO had already resigned. Ms White was still part of the institution and went through an internal disciplinary process where she was found guilty on the counts mentioned. She decided to challenge the outcome against her at the CCMA and the CCMA ruled in favour of the council. Ms White decided to take the matter to the labour court where it was currently sitting. The WHAG had appointed a legal team to assist in defending the matter. Mora Incorporated also took disciplinary action against the internal representative and he was also found guilty.

Ms White decided to take early maternity leave after she was called in for questioning during the investigation period.

The new director was appointed In May 2022 after the process had been concluded.

Mr Mailo said the WHAG did make a request to the DASC for the secondment of a CEO, but they did not succeed as secondment was only applicable to structures that had a provision for the position of CEO. The  WHAG did have that; it only had a director.

He said they could provide the breakdown of fees paid to consultants.

The Gallery did not have a position for a project manager. An amount of R24 million was allocated for the implementation of the HVAC system and related infrastructure projects. The appointment of a project manager was because the entity needed to go out on an open bidding process for professional service providers like quantity surveyors or mechanical engineers. 

Regarding donor funding, he said the Gallery was in the process of analysing the strategy. It did not suffice that it relied on the MTN partnership which assisted with various outreach programmes. They were trying to reach out to as many sponsors as possible.

Mr Phuti Phukubje, Chairperson, Audit Risk Committee, WHAG, stated that Committee was aware of the risk that when the CFO was also acting director, she would be inundated with responsibilities. She needed to prepare financial statements and would possibly be the one to review them as well. The Committee came up with an interim solution of appointing a service provider to help with the review.

The CFO, Ms Ramafalo, said a provision for litigation had not been made as the legal representatives still rested on the ruling by the CCMA in favour of the WHAG. They said it was difficult to predict that it would be overturned and what the costs would be.

The accounting authority and the council set the below 60 percent target for employee costs. The DSAC had also mentioned the limit. Keeping these costs below 60 percent was one of the reasons the entity had capacity constraints.

Previously, the WGAG did not receive clean audits as there were internal control deficits. In the current period they had worked hard to implement controls and policies, but she acknowledged that there were still areas for improvement.

DSAC responses

Mr Sibusiso Tsanyane, Deputy Director, DSAC, said the Department did receive ad hoc requests from entities to assist in seconding officials where there had been suspensions and sometimes resignations. He said the department looked at whether they had the capacity to make secondments and also looked at sister institutions to ascertain whether there was capacity for assistance. Where the DASC could assist, they always engaged people who came from public entities.

The Department did not get involved in issues of disciplinary action as that was the mandate of an employer-and-employee relationship. They could offer advice, but that was normally where it ended. 

Ms Nocawe Mafu, Deputy Minister of Sport, Arts and Culture, commented that the questions from Committee Members and responses from the entities demonstrated all parties’ understanding of their roles in oversight and accountability. 

She further stated that she did not get a clear response on plans by the WHAG regarding digitised artwork and the shortcomings they discovered during COVID-19. She requested that they look into this and give a written response in that regard.

She encouraged the entities to remember that their role was important in assisting the Department in nation building and social cohesion.

She commented that there were still artists out there needing to have their work curated, meaning there were still areas for improvement in the entity.
 
Closing remarks

The Chairperson thanked ATM for their work and encouraged them to promote the importance of symbolism in communities and schools. She added that ATM needed to develop a recovery plan for restoring pre-pandemic levels. She commended them for improving their audit opinion and achieving a clean audit.

ATM members were released from the meeting.

The Chairperson commented that despite the capacity constraints and the entity being heavily dependent on the department’s operational grant, the Gallery attained a clean audit and continued to fulfil its mandate, which was highly commendable.

She requested that any gaps and outstanding responses be forwarded to the Committee Secretary.

The Chairperson thanked all present for attending and engaging meaningfully in the meeting despite it being a Friday which was seen as the weekend already.

The meeting was adjourned.