Audit Outcomes: AGSA briefing; Commission for Gender Equality 2018/19 Annual Report

Meeting report

AGSA on audit outcomes

Ms Ilze Slabbert, Senior Manager, AGSA, presented on the audit outcomes of the Department of Women, Youth and Persons with Abilities.

The overall achievement that was reported was the good performance by the National Youth Development Agency (NYDA). The audit review over the last five years showed the NYDA maintained good audit outcomes over the years. In terms of credible financial reporting, the portfolio for the Department showed that there was effective implementation of daily and month controls that facilitated the valid, complete and accuracy of the financial reporting. The financial statements submitted had been properly reviewed by management and supported with sufficient and appropriate documentation.

It was said that improvements were necessary in the Department of Women and the Commission of Gender Equality (CGE). With respect to compliance with legislation, these departments needed to take effective and appropriate steps to prevent irregular expenditure. The Department of Women in particular was recommended to take steps to prevent fruitless and wasteful expenditure and to improve on the its acquisition of procurement of services and goods. Further, the Department had not submitted quarterly reports to the executive authority as required by Treasury regulations under 5.3.1 and had failed to provide sufficient evidence detailing disciplinary steps taken against officials who had incurred irregular expenditure including fruitless and wasteful expenditure as set out under section 38(1)(h)(iii) of the PFMA.

It was found that there were no material uncertainties that existed within the departments but noted that currently, the liabilities at the Department of Women exceeded its assets. This was a result of unauthorised expenditure incurred in the prior financial years, which continued to affect the Department and placed it under increased risk of liquidity concerns. This means that the Department is at risk of being unable to pay its creditors as payments become due. The Department also had a negative cash balance as at 31 March 2019 which puts it under high risk in the event of financial setbacks and its ability to provide basic services and could compromise its financial commitments. There is also concern about the Department of Women’s increased irregular expenditure and fruitless and wasteful expenditure over the last two years which has not been investigated and regarded as a material non-compliance in the audit report.

Discussion

Ms S Khawula (EFF) said she agreed with what had been said, but said that she would like to have a discussion on professional ethics. Children should be taught from an early age about ethics to avoid what we are experiencing today. She proposed to meet with the Department of Education to motivate the introduction of ethics from an early stage at schools. People should know at an early age that whatever they are doing, they will need to be accountable and they need to be transparent.

She referred to page 27 and proposed that Treasury should come up with a system more or less the same as the ATM system whereby when the Department uses money, Treasury can see who this money was paid to rather than wait until the damage is already done. When people report on a quarterly basis, they report on something that is already wrong. She notes that nothing is being done to these people who are misusing taxpayer’s money – instead they go back to Treasury and are given money again.

Mr L Mphiti (DA) stated that he had been off for some time but wanted to extend condolences to the ANC caucus for their loss. There were quite a number of discrepancies between what the Department was reporting versus the report from the Auditor-General. It was concerning, because he questioned the accuracy of the information provided to the Committee. For example, on page 95 of the Annual Report, there was a contradiction presented by the Department regarding their target versus the report they submitted to the Auditor-General, e.g. the time when the report was submitted did not align with regulation provided for by Treasury guidelines. Another example was the investigation the Department said it had done but the AG’s report stated differently.

It was concerning that the Department continued to have such high deviation rates because from his understanding, deviations are only for emergencies or extraordinary circumstances. If managers and directors easily use deviations in excess it becomes a concern - 56 deviations were unacceptable in his view.

On failure to adhere to legislation and compliance, he wanted to understand how the Department had responded to questions relating to this because it was concerning that the laws had been put into place but were not being adhered to. Even though it was noted in the presentation that there were not that many findings in this regard, it was still of concern and he wanted clarity.

There is mention of consequence management, but where HR issues, supply chain and internal control issues are concerned, there seemed to be a lack of consequence management and follow-ups. In public sectors, mistakes happen and where there are mistakes, there needs to be some level of accountability mechanisms that to come into play. There is a concern about consequence management particularly because of the levels of expenditure. What was the advice given to the Department and managers about the failure to consequence manage officials who are deviating from processes or finding themselves with irregular expenditure? On the HR issues, there has been litigation that has continued for quite some time and have not been finalised, and he asked if AGSA had involvement in these issues and he also would like clarity about these issues going forward.

The Chairperson said Members should separate questions that need to be asked directly to the Department and those that need to be directed to the AG’s office.

Mr Mphiti stated that his questions were an attempt to try and understand the engagement of the team based of the report they had provided as they would not be able to account for the Department. It was important to ask these questions to understand the other side and also to give the Committee some guidance for when the Department comes.

The Chairperson said when it comes to consequence management and the outstanding cases, nothing had been done. When the Department comes to present their report, they will have to provide the Committee with a progress report so the questions raised should be remembered for such time. If needs be, there can be a comparison made between the Committee’s recommendations vis-à-vis the AG’s recommendations because these could assist in the meeting with the Department.

Ms N Sharif (DA) said that she agreed with Honourable Mphiti and she appreciated the presence of the AGSA to ensure that there is transparency. She asked what the AG’s findings were regarding the performance rewards of the Department because when looking at the discrepancies, it becomes critical because the Department is giving incorrect information on how much is being spent on performance rewards versus how much the AG has found.

The AG had said the Department had insufficient oversight on internal control. What materials had the AG asked for with respect to the ineffective oversight and had the Department indicated how they would improve the ineffective oversight. If we have an ineffective Department that cannot affect oversight on itself then there is a problem. It is evident that there has been a huge concern regarding oversight for the past five years which is unacceptable. On disciplinary cases, again she said there is a discrepancy between what the Department has said and the findings by the AG. Tt feels that the Department is to some extent misleading.

She asked for further clarity about the fruitless and wasteful expenditure and what that actually meant for the people on the ground and the impact this would have on their lives.

Ms T Mgweba (ANC) said she welcomed the presentation from the AG and that was it good to see that the Department had been improving over the two years. The AG had mentioned the procurement policy framework and she asked how would it work to improve the Supply Chain Management. There was mention made about intervention of compliance, so how would the AG assist the Department from time to time improve their compliance and also their procurement in supply management?

Ms T Masondo (ANC) said that she had noticed that all the other entities had been included in presentation but what was being said about disabled persons. Why were they not included in the presentation? Had the Department of Social Development been audited?

The Chairperson explained that the Department had not yet been included as there was a new mandate that had been proclaimed by the President under this new administration.

Ms F Masiko (ANC) said expressed the same sentiments by other Members about welcoming the report and the simplicity of understanding the report. She referred to the monitoring of the action plan by the AG. Among the recommendations made was that the Portfolio Committee monitors the action plan. The report shows that there is an amount of about R27 million laying in the bank as an overdraft from the 2014/15 financial year and has been carried over and surely the action plan addresses this overdraft that the Department has and also the impact on the adverse findings that happen every year. Therefore, how far do these action plans go and in terms of monitoring these actions plans and compliance and the implementation of these action plans by the Department?

The World Festival of Youth and Students has been a matter that has been long outstanding since 2010. It being with the Public Protector for so long, does it prevent the NYDA from conducting its own investigations on the matter and what is the view of the AG on this matter also considering the expansion of the mandate? Is it a common occurrence that things stay on the audit dock for such a long time?

The Chairperson mentioned her concern on where there is an over allocation of funds for the compensation of employees not in their core business. On deviations, she asked how the AG treated such cases and if audits are done annually or quarterly. She also asked if the AG could explain the outstanding reports regarding financial health, starting from the year of Minister Lulu Xingwane. What process need to happen?

Ms Slabbert said AGSA completely echoes the thoughts about ethics and would be fully supportive of that being introduced at a school level to ensure that ethics forms the corner stone for these issues. What needs to be addressed is the element of proactive monitoring. AGSA did not audit on a quarterly basis, but midway during the year attended the risk committee of the Department that is on a quarterly basis and provide input. The quarterly assessments of compliance is really an internal function within the Department, AGSA do a statement of review - sometimes more than once going in to see what is the progress in terms of the Department implementing corrective action regarding the matters that were reported and provide feedback to the accounting officer. There is proactive monitoring and where there are warning signs the office exercises some procedures to see whether there is additional risk in the process. For example, in the past year there were issues around the directors which were highlighted to the Department and corrective action was taken and by the time the hearing for the audit came, that was no longer an issue.

On wasteful expenditure, she said it had been noted from the interactions that there were discrepancies between the presentations provided by the Department and the AG.  A big reason for that could potentially be that, for example with regard to investigations conducted, there is no evidence provided for of this nature that the AG’s office can satisfy itself to say that these investigations had taken place. So perhaps the differences noticed between the two was because of a lack of proper record keeping.

She offers her apologise if she expressed herself incorrectly on the performance awards. It was about the performance reported in terms of the achievement where issues arose. AGSA only audit in terms of what the Department determines themselves. In other words, the Department compiles their annual performance plans and some technical indicators to show how they determined their achievements, as evidence. Same thing applies with the record keeping. If you say you want approval of a framework that was approved by a Minister and such document cannot be produced, AGSA cannot satisfy itself to say that there was achievement. There is a chance the Department might have done something but there was no evidence to prove this from the Auditor’s perspective and which is why it is noted in the presentation regarding proper record keeping.   

Ms Macunga explained that fruitless and wasteful expenditure was expenditure that could have been avoided had proper procedure been follow. In this case, the Department had paid salaries for services not rendered so the impact of that is that somebody could been employed and paid that salary and that is how wasteful expenditure would impact on somebody else.

Ms Slabbert said that the explanation provided was perfect because when a Department has fruitless and wasteful expenditure, that is money that could have been used in a cause of government and the implementation of its goal. If reasonable care had been taken, that expense could have been avoided. This has an impact on the citizens as this money would have to be recouped to enable implementation of a mandate or entity.

There were quite a number of questions about deviations. First, when procurement is done, the PFMA Treasury laws and ancillary laws such the Preferential Procurement Policy Framework Act all have rules regarding what should be done before procuring a service. To adhere to these rules and regulations, it takes quite some time. It cannot be decided in half an hour to procure a service for 700 000 because this would have to go out on tender and to go out on tender and gather the minimum number of quotations takes some time. That is why in the presentation, it was said properly procurement planning was essential. Deviations are allowable in terms of the PFMA. It is not something that is taboo and there can be a deviation with respect to procurement where there is a sole service provider. For example, where a Department or an entity procured a supplier, the AG would investigate to see whether this service provider was the sole service provider, because the aim is economic efficiency. The second way to get a deviation is when there is an emergency and an emergency was unforeseeable, i.e., something that you could not have known would happen. If the Department should have known earlier, we would regard the deviation as unjustifiable.

The Chairperson explained that 56 deviations seemed excessive.

Mr Mphiti, in an attempt to clarify the question, said at the beginning of the financial year, there is a plan to procure services for upcoming projects. It seems there are no quotations which is part of the process for supply chain management and procurement. How many times is there just one sole provider in the Department?

The Chairperson said that there was no need for the AG’s office to respond because it was a question to be addressed by the Department.

Mr Mphiti said they were a new committee and sometimes such questions may seem like rhetorical but an answer was needed to enable the Committee to engage.

Ms Slabbert explained that from the audit processes what was discovered as expressed in the presentation was that there was irregular deviation. Deviations should not be used on a day-to- day basis and it was recommended that on a quarterly basis there should be a report as to why the deviation was approved. It was unfortunate that once it has happened, it has happened and nothing can be done about it. That is why the Department should start now to implement measures to make sure that these findings are not repetitive in the coming year and is mainly because of planning.

On consequence management she said it is important for the Department to be appropriate capacitated because for as long as they can fall back on not being appropriately capacitated, it is difficult to hold them accountable. However, now there is an annual assessment process in place, it is important that they do procure the necessary human capacity.

With regards to the questioning in terms of the admin capability versus its core function, obviously the Department has been put to fulfil a certain role. Core function capabilities are incredibly important especially in light of GBV. In the same vein, the matters we are referring to here sit in the matters referred to under programme one. It does not help that the core functions are fully capacitated then programme one is under capacitated or vice versa. It is a balancing action and the Department should explain to the Committee how they intend to do it.

In terms of the AG’s mandate, she said a lack of improvement was what prompted the amendment in legislation. It is punitive in nature however it is there to ensure that accountability comes into play. There are ways to addressing but if these are constantly ignored then there will be consequence.

On inappropriate expenditure, she said the Department needs to approach Parliament to provide the Standing Committee on Public Accounts with reasons. Regardless, there needs to be authorisation for this expenditure with funding or without funding. The Department needs to have constant engagement with Parliament in that regard so the matter can be closed.

On the audit action plan, she said AGSA avails itself to have a look at these actions plans from the Department to ensure that the critical areas have been addressed and when implemented, are programmes that are beneficial. It was important to ensure that names are provided in terms of who is going to take responsibility regarding a particular implementation project and appropriate deadlines to ensure that those processes are addressed quickly.

Ms Masiko said members from the Department present who can go back and prepare to answer the Committee on the deviations. She also wanted to be provided with the previous statements of deviation and if there can be an evaluation of these deviations on a case-by-case basis.

Chairperson said the person from the Department was present and would provide the information during the meeting with the Department.

Ms Sharif asked for clarity on the paid salaries for services not rendered.

Ms Macunga said this basically referred to employment settlement agreements. For example, there was a settlement where someone was dismissed unfairly that went to arbitration so they had to settle. That resulted in the Department paying more compared to if the matter had been appropriately handled.

Mr Mphiti wanted clarity on the follow up on the investigation, i.e., what was the recommendation made and what exactly was the condonation made by the accounting officer. Where an accounting officer makes certain condonations, what are the rules and how does the office of the AG engage with that particular matter?

Ms Slabbert said with regards to value for money, Treasury had a supplier data base and there was an assumption that when people were on the data base it can be ensured that they can provide services that value for money. The audit compares the prices provided to see if there are any prices that are above the norm from a reasonability perspective. If there are concerns, it is taken up with management and get the reason behind that. If they do end up paying more for an item, it is noted as a potential risk for wasteful expenditure. However, the strict procurement processes aids in ensuring that the Department gets value for money. There were no findings regarding value for money in this financial cycle.

The PFMA prescribes that where there is an instance of wasteful expenditure, there is no materiality attachment to it, it is by law that the accounting officer must investigate that and this investigation needs to conclude prior to any condonation. It is a requirement by law regardless of what the AG recommends. This is also to ensure that there are not any other underlying matters in that transaction. At the conclusion of the investigation, it then when it is determined whether someone must be held liable and it is then the prerogative of the accounting officer to say whether there can be condonation.

Mr Ngcobo stated that his question was about the general amended mandate and the officiating of that mandate.

A researcher asked for clarity regarding the audit actions plans, when that was approved

Mr Shongwe stated that the audit action plan was approved a month before the end of the financial year.

Ms Slabbert, on the mandate, said this was the first year in terms of implementation so she was not able to provide figures from the top of her head but would provide information on that. For material irregularities they have been reflected and the Auditor-General himself made a presentation regarding this last week. Because it is still under phasing in stage, there have not been any certificates of debt issues to departments. It is issued by the AG, but it is up to Parliament to exercise oversight to see that these debts are recovered.

The Chairperson thanked AGSA and said there needed to be a date provided for a workshop for the Committee to get updated on the legislation.

Ms Slabbert stated that a morning session would suffice

The Chairperson said an application will be made to Parliament to facilitate the workshop.

Department of Women 2018/19 Annual Report overview

Ms C Levendale. Researcher, Parliament, noted that the Department provided its APP in May and in August of the previous year, they submitted an erratum.

With respect to page 6, it was noted that the Department was allocated an amount of R149.5 million for the financial year and when looking at page 7, the AG has provided the Department a lot of information and page 7 provided a comparison of the budget on a yearly basis.

With regard to page 8 the table shows the shift of funds between programmes.

Page 9 reflects the shifts of funds from primary programmes to core programmes. The Department said it managed to have a surplus of R7.8 million for the financial year

With respect to page 11 there is an overview of the Department’s performance. Overall the Department achieved 22 of the 32 targets set out for the year with a success rate of 67% but spent 94.7% of its budget.

With respect to programme 1, 11 of the 15 targets were achieved by the Department with a success rate of 73.3% and the total budget spent at 98.1%. Programme 2 there was only 1 achieved target of the 5 set therefore there was a 20% success rate and 99.4% of the budget was used. In respect of programme 3, 10 of the 12 targets that were set were achieved with a 83% success rate and spent 84.1% of its budget. On page 12, there is an overall performance assessment provided for the 2017/2018 year for comparative purposes.

The Department states that it has improved in terms of achieving its target - from achieving 59% to 69%. The concern is that with that, there have been programmes for instance programme 2, that have been underperforming year on year. There are certain programmes that have been underperforming continuously.  Initially, there were seven targets under Programme 2, however the Department did not meet these targets.

There is a lack of value for money as the Department was spending most of its budget, which few targets met.

On a general basis, a lot more work needs to be done by the Department.

Commission for Gender Equality Annual Report 2018/2019 review

Page 4 highlight the allocation of the Commission was R80 735 000. More money was spent on compensation and employees because the Commission is a labour intensive therefore more money needs to be spent in this regard.

The Commission was able to augment their funds to R81 million and managed to have surplus of R785 494 for the financial year which were attribute to the vacancies in the CGE.

Overall the Commission has achieved 88% of its targets where they achieved 29 out of the 33. For Objective 1, the Commission achieved 6 out of the 9 set targets which meant that there was a 66% success rate. In terms of Objective 2, the Commission achieved 100% of 12 set targets and with respect to Objective 3, 11 out of the 12 targets were met (91.6% success rate)

Department of Women, Youth and Persons with Disabilities Annual Report 2018/2019 review

Ms K Abrahams, Committee Content Adviser, said the aim here was to show Members that many of the issues raised were not new issues but come from many years before. The APPs and Strategic Plans have been reused in many instances. This document was to provide Members with an idea what had to be dealt over the past 5 years.

Page two indicates the changes that happened and what years these changes occurred, whether something had been tabled or an erratum has been submitted.

Programme 1 has always performed better than the core programmes along with programme 3.

BRRR and CGE

There have been high rates of case management. Therefore, the CGE should address how it will deal with case management and the roll-over of cases

With respect to gender-based violence the CGE has picked high rates on it therefore the key questions to ask would be what its strategy to deal with GBV over the next five years. The same applies to shelters.

The key issue with transformation is what strategy that the CGE will implement to address this issue in the next five years.

What are the pieces of legislation that the CGE believes needs reforming?

Discussion

Ms Sharif said the report pretty self-explanatory. The Committee was meant to have a presentation from the Interim Committee on the National Strategic Plan on GBV, but it postponed. She asked when the Committee will have that presentation. That presentation would help answer some of the questions Members have and she asked that the meeting be expedited.

CGE on its 2018/19 Annual Report

Ms T Mathebula, Chairperson, CGE, said in the 2018/19 financial year, the Commission adopted a Strategic Plan that looked at the years 2019-2024. The plan presented new opportunities for the Commission to re-align its efforts with the emerging issues given the magnitude of issues facing the country. The strategy aims to project a much higher impact of the Commission and for public benefit. The strategy allows the Commission to make notable outcomes in numerous areas particularly those aimed at attaining social justice. Along the Strategic plan, there is an annual development plan and annual budgets that are fully aligned to the CGE’s mandate with key thematic areas. Those key thematic areas were thoroughly thought through and among these themes are GBV, women economic empowerment, health, human trafficking and others, which have not been mentioned.

There is current financial improvement as per the AG’s directive. The Commission has received a total allocation of R80 million last year and has also received an unqualified audit in the previous year which ended in March 2019. The CGE has showed compliance with National Treasury laws and regulations regarding the past and current irregular expenditures that have been incurred. Therefore, the Commission has been able to use the regulation which came into effect on the 14 of December last year and ended this year early May. CGE used those regulatory window periods to temporary confer powers to condone some of the irregular expenditure that had been carried over that really assisted in addressing the longstanding hurdles that stood between the CGE obtaining a clean audit. The CFO’s report highlights this in detail.

Regarding the APP implementation during the financial period under review, the Commission along with the Secretariat worked to report that all the departments were under review for example the research unit as well as the legal unit worked towards holding hearings and holding people to account including the State for lack of adherence to legislation and policies in as far as gender equality is concerned.

There was engagement with the South African Police services regarding the matters relating to GBV. SAPS was called for public investigative hearings to report to the Commission on strengthening systems within SAPS and how arrests and charges were being dealt with. SAPS has appeared before the Commission twice now to look at quite a number of challenges that SAPS has had. The key findings were that there was poor turn around on the administration of the DNA testing specifically cases involving GBV. The CGE made quite a lot of noise in this respect of the DNA tests and the kits that were unavailable in some police stations. There was poor enforcement in terms of poor performance of protect orders, with women dying with protection orders on their backs. There was inadequate training of SAPS officials themselves to deal effectively with GBV. There were inadequate victim friendly rooms in police stations and police vehicles to address matters quickly. Some survivors were not taken for medical examinations or sent to places of safety when needed. It must be mentioned, having failed on implementing the recommendations, the Commission had to call SAPS back. In the Commission’s quest to monitor progress, SAPS has been given another set of recommendations. Announcements have been made that kits have been procured and have been delivered in provinces. The Commission would go have a look at the deployment of these kits and enquire into whether there were still some police stations that were struggling to procure these adult and paediatric kits.

Some of the reports related to correctional services and in this regard, the plight of female inmates and how they were suffering in those correctional institutions were highlighted.

The Commission as also looked at procurement and gender transformation in government institutions. Last year numerous hearings were held with the national Department of Health, Department of Rural Development and Land Reform. The Department of Basic Education was called as well the Department of Social Development. Their procurement systems were looked at broadly particularly in line with the Procurement Policy Framework Act and as well as in line with the B-BBEE Act.

CGE also had an investigation into gender equality at institution of higher learning by looking at 22 universities out of the 26 to look at women’s empowerment. The report will be launched soon.

In addition, CGE did investigation work that dealt with the state of shelters in South Africa. This particular report stirred up a lot of conversations in South Africa because there were quite a number of complaints by people who accessed these shelters to say that the state of these shelters was not okay. When looking at shelter information, supervision there is poor, safety is unavailable, accommodation criteria and term of stay was sometimes shorter. At times, people were discharged to go when they were not quite ready to return. Resource allocation by the Department of Social Development was also looked into and in some provinces, funding came from the Department of Safety. The Commission looked at the entire service package that was given to the shelter and came to the realisation that the service package was not uniform whereby some were given more and some were given less. In addition, observation was given to substance abuse and rehabilitation of women that was provided in these shelters and the relationship the shelters had with SAPS. Recommendations were made to address what should happen in these shelters and a meeting was required with the Department of Social Development to discuss these recommendations.

Regarding the APP in general, the Commission has about 80% of the set targets for the previous financial year. Another highlight is that the Commission has been able to engage at various levels - not only on a national level but also on an international level.

At the national, the Commission looked at the gender pay gap in South Africa where it was noted in 2018 that there was a world economic gender pay review that had ranked South Africa at 91 out 149 countries on economic opportunities and participation. This was a concern particularly because the review stated that women in South Africa were often faced with triple oppression and women were not getting adequate payment for work done.

There was also an enquiry into the South African Football Association gender pay gap matter because when comparison is made between Bafana Bafana and Banyana Banyana, the payment gap was quite wide. At regional level as well as international level, the Commission has participated and the request made to the Commission by the UNSECO Information Communication Sector Committee to host a conference on international day regarding access to information. In this respect, the Commission will focus on the access of information to women in South Africa and remind stakeholders of the need to advance access to information in order to empower women with adequate tools to use to improve their lives. An important area currently for the CGE is the impact of the fourth industrial revolution with regards to women empowerment and the likes.

 In line with the mandate of the Commission in so far as domestication of international policy is concerned, the Commission participated in the AU Commission for Human and People’s Rights as well as Women’s rights in Bunjul that usually takes places between the periods of October and November last year and will be participating this year. The Commission also participated in the United Nations 63rd CSW which is the Commission of the Status of Women’s Session, whereby there were 6 satellite coverage that aided in the visibility of the Commission and allowed the Commission to share a lot of lessons and as well practice models.

Ms K Maema CEO, CGE, reported that on the APP implementation that only three targets in respect of advancing an enabling legislative environment for gender equality were not reached. A target that had not been achieved was creating a knowledge management strategy under the strategy objective of building an efficient organisation that promotes and protects gender equality. The Commission wanted to specifically highlight was that the report that has been conducted had to be translated into impact. What has been done during the process of the year is to task the research team to create a monitoring framework that allows for some of the outcomes that have been implemented and also some of the intervention that have been implemented by the Department irrespective of whether they have an overall impact the CGE and other gender related matters. This is an internal monitoring tool to assess CGE’s own impact. Reports have been done but then what happens of the ground. It was necessary to have tools that are not only used internally but externally that say that there is impact after making the report.

Ms Mathebula said the Commission has improved its use of media as a vehicle to achieve its goal to gain exposure. In the past week alone, the Commission was on numerous media platforms with the Department of Basic Education dealing with sexual harassment in schools. They were reaching numerous radio stations, national and rural ones and really utilising media for coverage.

Adv N Sepanya-Mogale, Commissioner, CGE, said it was fundamental for the mandate of the CGE to influence. They had influenced dialogue in a great way and managed to achieve a teacher’s day on the 1st October where it is not just general teaching but teaching on sexual violence. The Commission literally gave directive about areas that should be focused on and would continue moving forward.

CGE Financial Statements and PFMA matters

Mr M Putu, CFO, CGE, explained that there had been a decline in solvency and that the Commission’s status on liquidity remained steady because of the liability that had been balanced over the years. A net surplus was incurred during the financial year whereby the vacancies of Commissioners aided in this surplus.

In terms of human resources, the Commission employees constituted mainly of females and fully represented previously disadvantage groups. However, improvement was required in terms of employing persons with disabilities who were under represented. Further there were more males that occupied positions in finance and legal and the Commission would address this with its employment equity plans. A notable achievement was a decline in expenses in training in the 2018/19 financial  year in comparison to the previous financial year. Another achievement were the leave days taken by employees which was 17.8 days against the 22 days granted by law. In respect to sick leave, the average sick leave taken was 9 days versus the 36 leave days granted over a 3-year period.

Discussion

Ms Masondo asked if the visits and surplus are budgeted for or does it just happen that there is a surplus amount. Why was there an overload of total of files opened and closed between 2018/19 when compared to 2017/18? Why are there so many pending cases in Gauteng, Eastern Cape, KZN and North West provinces? Are there any cases that were rolled over from 2017/18 that have not yet been resolved? If yes, how many and what are the reasons that these cases have not yet been concluded? What is the CGE’s strategy to deal with GBV and Femicide in the next five years.

Ms M Hlengwa (IFP) said she did not hear any tangible things that had been done to the people on the ground who are vulnerable and trying to uplift with no shelter. What are you going to do about that rather than the money returning to Treasury?

Ms Mgweba said she too welcomed the presentation from the CGE and agreed with the conclusion made by the CGE in terms of their first presentation that they have been able to accomplish much of their targets and as the committee acknowledge the limited resources to the Commission.

However, on GBV, one would want to understand the responsibility of the FCF unit. She said she had just visited police stations in the Ekhuruleni, Benoni area and were then told by the captain, and two female cornels how the unit was doing its work in terms of the DNA or the rape kits. She then observed that it was not really police officers but that there was a delegated colonel that monitored the process through professional assessments and counselling. She therefore wanted to understand from the Commissioners, their relation in terms of monitoring those units at the police stations.

There are five cases in Springs, four cases for 2018, one for 2017 based in Springs, and cases in Kwa-Thema of children from ages 5-8 years. There have been withdrawals from all five cases. She proposed that the Commissioners look at these cases and follow up on these cases especially for the 5-year-old.

On women in correctional facilities, she asked what were the Commission’s engagement with the Minister of Correctional Services and how the Commission would address some of the issues arising on that level.

Also, she said she would like to understand on the BRRR, how does the Commission then develop the country in respect of treaty compliance as these are important for engaging with foreign stakeholders to show them that the country was also involved. How do you then deal with the exit plan of your staff?

Mr Mphiti said in the previous financial year, the AG cited an amount of R900 000 that was due because internal controls had not been implemented. He said he would like to understand, what the immediate internal controls were that were put in place and if there are immediate internal controls and they have not been implemented, what was the reason? When are these investigations going to be concluded? Do we have a date? Do we know when we will be able to find out? One of the amounts mentioned is an amount of over R 293 000 that was due to a complete disregard to supply chain management. What type of responsibility has been taken on by officials? What type of contingency plan has been put in place to address this issue? In this financial year there has been an amount of over R20 000 of fruitless and wasteful expenditure due to premiums of officials or employees that were receiving subsidies. Who approved this and what action has been taken with regards to this? Why is it so easy for internal controls to just be ignored even when it related to something quite clear in the rules in terms of medical aid since it is tied to the salary scale or the position that is filled. What are the immediate consequences that have been taken in regard to officials who have ignored procurement planning and contract management and where does public funding come in?

On case management, he noticed the wording which is ‘handled’ 80% of cases and it did not mean outcome. That is why there is a backlog of case which is at approximately 524 cases that have not been handled or have been resolve.

The mandate of the CGE is about influencing the discourse; it is about continuing to educate, lobbying and monitoring issues regarding gender equality. He therefore thought there should be some form of responsiveness outside media. He said he knew the difficulty MPs faced with engaging with the general community and said that more work needs to be done in terms of not just being in parameters of the conversation and providing for the conversations to happen but being on the field to play the ball as well.

Mr Ngcobo congratulated the CGE on its submission on the law reform recommendations to the Department Correctional Services. My question is around law reform. Is the CGE able to keep track of the law reform recommendations that were actually corrected by the Department? What strategy does the CGE have to engage with the Minister of Justice and Correctional Services to address other related matters, particularly relating to sexual related offences, GBV and other matters.

 Ms Khawula said that there was a case in KZN of a family whose house had been burnt down leaving the family without shelter. This case had still not been addressed and the family remained without shelter. The LGBTQI community complained that they have not been included in the budget and request that they be included. There is also an issue with marriages where Home Affairs officials and some ministers and pastors refuse to marry the LGBTQI community.

Perhaps it would be best we go back to the pre-1994 laws to look at particularly around children. Currently children are uncontrollable and there is currently legislation that one cannot discipline their own child at home and that is a problem at this stage. Taverns that are open throughout the night and children go drink at any time they like. These taverns should be closed.

In Rengelani people in shelters live in deplorable conditions.  

In KZN, girls purchase potions from Indian pharmacies that they use on men. They go out to taverns, return home late then abuse men and men are too afraid to go to the police station to report these matters because they feel they do not have as many rights as women.

Ms Sharif requested contact details of the Commissioners because MPs are sometimes faced with queries that they cannot effectively deal with and it would be easier to provide that information to CGE. One example was that she had received a call from a citizen who lives in Soweto from the Protea Glen police station, explaining that a foreign national woman was experiencing abuse from her husband. However, when she got to the police station she had been turned back by the police and told to return to her country and that there was nothing that could be done to help her. When she spoke to the woman who is from Rwanda she said she did not want to press charges anymore because she prefers to deal with the matter as a family with traditional healers. For her, she said, if the police had opened a case and arrested him, this would not have happened but because the woman felt there was nowhere for her to turn. When enquiring about her legal status and she said she found that she was in the country legally and had her documentation but said that the police did not care to ask about that and rather turned her away. When asked to come identify these police officers she refused. She feared that he was going to continue hitting her and God forbid something worse happens to her. Another example is young kids going missing and there not being case numbers at police stations. Having a Commissioner on call or hand who might be able to give information to help deal with these issues is needed.

There was mention made about recommendations made to SAPS. However, there is no report provided to show these recommendations and whether SAPS has implemented these recommendations. She requested a copy of the report.

The CGE is doing a great job in terms of cutting across departments, something the Department of Women should learn from the Commission. In fact, she thought that the Commission should provide a full day of training to the Department so they could become on par with CGE.

In terms of the DNA tests, she said she had constituencies in Soweto that consisted of a pretty large area of the Soweto West area but said none of the police station had DNA tests. Then one arrives at the police station, there are only 10 left. These police stations had started the procurement process but because of the new contract, they cannot give them the old tests they have to wait for the new test, which according to the Minister will arrive on the 14 October. Dobsonville for example, ranked number 10 in the country with the highest rape cases reported and has not had kits since 2017. As mentioned by a colleague, the FCS units are very important because if police station does not have rape kits, the FCS unit finds rape kits from other police stations they take to Thuthuzela centres to be used. However, interestingly she said when she tried to oversight at the FCS they refused to speak and give any form of information stating that she needed to make an appointment. It was a mission. How is the intergovernmental role going to increase oversight, monitoring and evaluation? These DNA kits are important. Without it how does one get justice for the survivor.

To add to the question about the CGE’s strategy on GBV and exercising oversight, she said already in government there was the President speaking about GBV, there was the national council now there was the emergency plan. There were just so many committees dealing with GBV and said there just seems to be no collaboration. What is the role of the CGE in terms of collaboration regarding the issues on GBV and femicide?  She said she would put these in silo and honestly would put all her faith the CGE than other departments of government because it seems the CGE has monitoring and evaluation and exercise oversight and could push this forward given that the CGE had good media presence and Commissioner all over the country. What will your role be? And if the CGE does not have one, she asked the CGE please consider being the boom that South Africa needed to bring it all together. She said that as a young woman in South Africa, she had no faith because we continuously deal with symptoms of the issues and not dealing with the actual issues, making it scary to live in the country.

There were many Thuthuzela centres and the Minister said there are going to be more. She explained that she went to the one at Baragwanath Hospital. In just one year they had over 1160 adult rape kits but they were under resourced and have been unable to assist with all the rape cases. The head nurse had asked for assist with fundraising to get care packages to give to victims once they leave the Thuthuzela centre. She asked how the CGE assists Thuthuzela centres and requested that maybe look at offsite Thuthuzela centres as this was a place where women and men who have been raped go to get assistance.

Ms Masiko said one of the tasks that had been to MPs by the ANC caucus during this constituency period had been to go out and deal with issues of GBV and violent crimes in communities. Among other things, said they were tasked with doing audits regarding the rape kits - both the adult and paediatric kits among police stations. It was not enough for the Committee to get a report and assume that the rape kits were out there. It was important for all Members to monitor police stations and not limit the discussion to boardrooms.

A call that has been made about government shelters and civil society shelters not being enough to cater for GBV victims. There needs to be an expedition of a joint committee between the Portfolio Committee, Social Development, SAPS and Health. Women have to go to a hospital and there they experience secondary abuse of some sort. Shelter for women and children was an urgent matter.

The issue of CSW was mentioned by the Chairperson. She said she had had the honour of attending CSW for the past four years and noted that the participation of the CGE this year had outdone all the other years. There had been an outcry that previously, whereby that CSW was an outing and that there was a lack of participation from South Africa but the CGE delivered this year and there was value for money.

 With respect to case management, what is the role of the Commissioners in provinces in resolving the cases? She said there should not be a case whereby these cases are just left to officials but asked whether Commissioner are resolving cases.

The report also touched on the issue of transformation in institutions of higher learning. Last month there had been an outbreak on Twitter of accounts that were aimed at naming and shaming male perpetrators who had in some way abused women, mainly raping. Most of these cases were reported by young women in tertiary institutions. She said that she received a case about three weeks ago of a rape of a young lady at the University of KwaZulu-Natal. There were reports of rape and there was a slow response, even where the matter involved a lecturer and female students. She explained that the case had gone on for two years and that resolution that had been resorted to was to remove the students and not the lecturer. What are the immediate actions that have been put on the table to fast track transformation in institutions of higher learning?

The Chairperson asked whether the offices had been standardised in terms of structure, staffing resources and effectiveness and efficiency. The last time, she had been told that there was a problem with the Limpopo office and was not sure if that could be addressed presently,

If CGE had an issue with fulfilling the disability requirement, how then would the office deal with empowerment of disabled people. CGE must lead by example because they are tasked with monitoring departments to ensure that they are adhering to the requirements.

The current GBV hype raises the question how the CGE would divide itself to monitor departments on other aspects such as women empowerment. This was raised during the xenophobic attacks. CGE needed to check how departments can aid in this respect. The private sector must also be addressed, monitored and held accountable but she did not know how this would be done.

With respect to advocacy of the Department, the CGE had not done enough to monitor advocacy in this regard because there is repeat result of no effort. Since the Department’s inception there has not been any stability and this should be a concern for the CGE. There seems to a disconnect between the CGE and the Department.

The issues that were raised by AG showed that there was room for improvement regarding compliance, contract management and that these issues should be made a priority.

There are currently talks by the Department of Basic Education to introduction a qualification at grade 9. She said the CGE should engage with Department to understand why this was being implemented and who would benefit from this. She said that education should be taken seriously.

Responses

Ms Mathebula said there was a request that we share documents and will be sent. She would also send the contact details of all the Commissioners.

In terms of the strategy to meet with the Minister, the CGE had written letters and received response that the Minister of Justice and Correctional Services would be available to meet in the course of the next few days. There has also been letter sent to other Ministers.

The Department did need to account and the CGE needed to hold them accountable for all their actions.

On transformation of institutions of higher learning, she said they would return and have a look and the plan during this financial year was to include FET Colleges as well. She said she was aware that the situation at DUT was terrible.

She said they would be looking at DNA kits and would address the issues raised by Honourable Khawula along with the issues around the Human Right Commission.

Adv N Sepanya-Mogale said that a lot of effort was put into turning the Commission around and took the input very seriously and would work towards that.

Mr M Botha, Commissioner, CGE, said there were no initiatives working with the boy child. He said that he had visited Meyerton and engaged with young boys to ask them why boys rape. One boy had stood up and said that it was because he was aroused and when he asked, he would get denied. These boys were a microcosm of what society was like. The Commission was conscious of doing work with boys so that the result would be tangible.

Ms Mathebula said the Commissioner had touched on a strategy that would be implemented, to work with men and boys in a joint system. CGE was trying to align its APP and strategy with the key concerns the President spoke about. After the address, the President made an allocation of a R6 billion emergency plan and CGE would like to be part of such emergency plan. Tf the CGE could access some of the funds, the Commission would turn things around. The Commission had spoken about lack of resources but if it could access a little bit of allocation, the CGE would do more. In addition, she stated that the landscape was changing and the CGE needed this allocation to be able to go all out to change

Mr Putu said the surplus was due to unforeseen expenditure and deviations. He said the deviations that were had were not material in percentage terms. Money spent was in accordance with the APP which basically focused on the CGE mandate. CGE spends money in line with regulations and excess money will always be reverted back to Treasury.

Ms Maema said the bigger issue that came about was the target set regarding the 80% of case. CGE could not act prematurely particularly when taking into account how delayed these processes were. Handled meant that the CGE was dealing with the matter even if they had not been finalised.

In terms of the issues raised by Mam ‘Khawula on Home Affairs, she said there was a specific case that the CGE was dealing with. There is a backlog but there are processes to be followed and CGE was willing to share the details of the case.

With respect to the police stations, the CGE had done its own investigation and noted that some of the police stations were wishy-washy about the kits. CGE started with 68 but would broaden.

In terms of the medical aid payment, she said every January, the CGE makes calls for employees that are level 10 and below to disclose their medical aids as they receive the benefit and come March the medical aid has been cancelled.

 In terms of law reform commission, she said that in some instances the CGE can track the changes but what was difficult to track were the bills in Parliament.

In terms of shelters, there was a report and the CGE would be calling all related parties to address shelters. The report was for the CGE to see what was happening. The report had a whole lot of issues relating to LGBTQI and the likes and there would be engagement with different entities such as Human Settlement. There was need standardise so there would be hearings that were upcoming to take these issues into account.

There was an issue raised about standardisation in Limpopo which she said she was unaware of but would follow the matter through.

Thuthuzela Care Centres was addressed in the victim’s chapter report and that there were problems that had been highlighted under those victim chapter reports. The CGE was also aware of that and was watching the space to see what would eventually happen so see if the recommendation made under the chapter would be taken forward.

In terms of transformation in institutions of higher learning, she said there was inclusion of the SRC to inform them as to what is required and engage with the Department of Higher Learning.

CGE noted its downfall about the disability factors and did acknowledge that more needed to be done in this regard.

She said the issues regarding the Department of Women were noted and she found that the Department did need a clear mandate and that there was something that the Department should be have been doing.

There are other issues, which the Commission addresses, and the CGE notes that there are structure issues.

Mr Mphiti stated that he had two follow up questioned. The one was about the amount the AG’s report had mentioned about the internal control and the second was the regarding the backlog

Mr Putu said that they did have standard processes put in place about what needed to happen about procurement. In this instance, the CGE had validly procured a supplier who provided a service on the basis of an order. He said that his point of emphasis was that there had not been instance for value of money. He explained the CGE had to pay for seeking their services and were legally obligated to.

The medical subsidy issue, he said has been recovered through disciplinary measures where employees misrepresented and were required to repay the money. He said there were only three that were affected.

With regard to the case backlog, the CGE will respond in writing and even provide reasoning.

Ms Ngcobo said using the approach of gender responsiveness and planning, there was close analysis of the NDP as it provides with guidance about where the country was going. CGE had done a gender analysis that inform all the chapters as to how to prioritise vulnerable such as women, children and persons living with disabilities.  These could be used in IDPs on local government level. It was a long journey from 2016 and started before then but were going the right way as the provinces that had come on board from the analysis that had been done.

Ms Ngcobo would assist with the cases mentioned by Ms Khawula.

Dr Moleko said that the mandate of the Department of Women had to be revisited because the downfalls of the Department were being shifted to the CGE. Most of the implementing work that is not done by the Department is then shifted to the CGE. CGE is not to the implementing arm of government. It is a Chapter 9 and the mandate of the CGE was to monitor, research, oversee, lobby, and advocacy education. She said that what can be understood from the Department and its interpretation of its role was to be the advocate for government. If that is not fixed there will continue to be dysfunctionality, a lack of coordination, and unclear indicators. How can the Department’s APP be revisited to align with the real needs of the country? Is it doing what is really necessary because the CGE is confined by its constitutional mandate.

The Chairperson said the Commissioner was raising the right issues. She said that in the last meeting with the Department, it had wanted to exclude disability and pass the responsibility to the Department of Social Development. The concerns raised to is exactly what the Department was told. In the last meeting, the Department was told to go and work on those services because the responsibility of Social Development was being transferred to the Department and the Department had to implement.

Meeting adjourned.