Department of Women, Youth and Persons with Disabilities Quarter 2 and 3 2021/22 Performance

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Meeting Summary

The Portfolio Committee convened in a virtual meeting to be briefed on the quarter-two and quarter-three performance reports of the Department of Women, Youth and Persons with Disabilities (DWYPD).

The Department's audit and risk committee presented its findings for the second quarter of the 2021/22 financial year. Management reported and provided assurance that 86% (30/335) of planned APP second quarter performance targets were achieved.

The Committee engaged in robust discussions on various matters including the use of contract workers, vacant posts, late payment of invoices and virements and deviations. The Committee was concerned that there were targets achieved but the expenditure did not match this performance. This was more worrisome as the Committee advocated for the Department to get more funding from Treasury. This raised questions of capacity. The Committee was not pleased about the outsourcing of work the Department should be doing and the quality of reports submitted to the Committee. Members stressed that the Department was responsible for monitoring and evaluating the gender-responsiveness of government but it seemed this core work was not being done satisfactorily. The Committee stressed it wanted to see how women, youth and persons with disabilities were benefitting from and in other government departments but this analysis was not forthcoming. The Committee said it appeared the Department was just "ticking boxes" at this stage. It was stressed that the Committee wanted to see the Department improve in carrying out its core mandate. There were also questions about the Department drafting legislation to assist with this core work of monitoring. It was stressed at the end of the current term of Parliament, that the Committee needed to demonstrate what the Department had achieved over that time. 

The Department presented its second quarter performance. Out of 35 targets planned, 30 (86%) targets were achieved while five (14%) were not achieved. Performance per programme was presented along with financial performance. 

The Committee asked about the resignation of officials, staffing issues, "ghost" employees, CSW and international protocols. There was concern about the high number of deviations, use of external service providers and the risk this presented, the Department's website and underspending. There was discussion on procurement and the delay in delivering on key resources such as laptops, which also affected underspending. Members asked why there were delays in transfers to the National Youth Development Agency, relocation of the Department's office, staff returning to work and children with disabilities not attending school. There was also discussion on ICT in the Department and the Department's work on the National Strategic Plan on GBV and Femicide

Meeting report

Opening Remarks by the Chairperson

The Chairperson began by apologising to Committee Members and all present for delaying the starting time of the meeting. She explained that the reason for the delay was due to the meeting that preceded running over its allocated time. The Committee was preparing for the session with its researchers.

Thereafter, the Chairperson declared the virtual meeting officially open and asked the Committee Secretary, Ms Neliswa Nobatana, to announce apologies.

Ms Nobatana greeted all Members and officials from the Department of Women, Youth and Persons with Disabilities (DWYPD) present in the meeting, and went on to confirm that she had received two apologies. One was from Mr L Mphithi (DA), who reported that he was not feeling well, and the other was from Ms P Sonti (EFF), who indicated that she would only be returning to work the following day.

Another apology was given by Adv. Mikateko Maluleke, Director-General (DG), DWYPD, on behalf of the Minister, who was unable to attend the meeting due to being hospitalised. She told the Chairperson that, once she had been in contact with the Minister’s family to get more details regarding the Minister’s condition, she would share same with the Committee.

The Chairperson thanked Adv. Maluleke for the information, and asked that the meeting proceed to the next item on the agenda – the presentation from the audit and risk committee on the second and third quarterly performance reports of the Department. She then handed over to its chairperson to lead the presentation.

After a long silence, the Committee Chairperson asked the DG if the audit and risk committee chairperson was present in the meeting.

The audit and risk committee chairperson confirmed her presence and proceeded with the presentation.

Before the presentation started, the Chairperson interjected asking Ms Gratitude Ramphaka, acting chairperson of the audit and risk committee, if she was the chairperson of the Audit and Risk Committee.

Ms Ramphaka confirmed that she was the acting chairperson.

The Committee Chairperson asked where the [permanent] chairperson was.

Ms Ramphaka explained that she was formally appointed to be the acting chairperson while the Department looks for a chairperson.

The Chairperson asked if the previous audit and risk committee chairperson had resigned.

Ms Ramphaka explained that the chairperson asked to be excused, as she will not be able to serve in her role as chairperson during this period.

The Chairperson asked the DG to give a report to the Committee regarding this matter, before proceeding to the presentation.

The DG explained that the audit and risk committee chairperson had many commitments, which will hinder her from serving the Department if she continued. As a result, she asked to be excused, hence Ms Ramphaka was the acting chairperson at the moment until the Department appointed a chairperson. The position had already been advertised, and the details of the new chairperson will be provided once the recruitment process was finalised.

The Chairperson thanked the DG for her explanation and handed over to Ms Ramphaka to continue with the presentation.

Audit and risk committee second-quarter performance report

Ms Ramphaka delivered the presentation to the Committee. She said that she would take the Committee through the presentation, which is the second- and third-quarter report and give a progress update of the audit and risk committee’s (ARC’s) recommendations.

[See presentation attached for more details]

Performance Information

Going through the performance information and detailing why the four performance targets were not achieved, Ms Ramphaka gave the following explanations:

Target Two: Inception Report on the Socio-Economic Empowerment Index

  • The Department issued some requests for proposals on two separate occasions, and there were poor responses from the market. The latest information that the ARC received from the Department was that the RSP was issued for the third time and will be closing on 25 February 2022.

Target Three: One intervention to support social empowerment and participation of women, youth and persons with disabilities implemented

  • The achievement of this target is dependent on the appointment of a service provider; the process was still underway.

Target four: Development of the SEIAS Report

  • It is anticipated that the SEIAS report will be completed in the third quarter.

Target five: NYDA Amendment Bill processed to Parliament

  • The Bill was tabled in Cabinet during the first quarter but only got approved in the third quarter.

Ms Ramphaka told the Committee that, at the time, these were the reasons for deviations that were provided. The Department tried to gather what the progress was to date.

ARC comment on second-quarter performance information

  • On the issue of the sanitary dignity framework, the ARC enquired about what management is doing to make sure that the report is reliable.
  • The ARC had an issue last year regarding the APP amendments for the 2021/22 financial year, and so it wanted to make sure that everything was in order.

Financial management

Looking at the financial management, the ARC had many concerns, especially with the performance information on targets not achieved, although the majority was achieved. The ARC got some assurance from the Department that it will prioritise the same matters that were relevant to those targets. However, when it came to financial management, the Department expenditure was a bit below what was expected in quarter two.

Programme Three: STEE

  • Management indicated that the closing date for the proposal was 01 December 2022, which was in the third quarter.

Ms Ramphaka told the Committee that it is anticipated that expenditure will improve following the implementation of those activities under programme four.

The Chairperson asked Ms Ramphaka to go back to programme three and explain again what was happening with this programme. She made Ms Ramphaka aware that she had said that the closing date for the proposal was 01 December 2022.

Ms Ramphaka rectified her mistake and told the Chairperson and the Committee that the correct date was 01 December 2021.

Management responded as follows concerning the financial management:

  • The review of the Demand Management Plan during the adjustment budget process was being led by the Accounting Officer, and in this review session, all targets that have the potential to adversely affect the achievement of the Annual Performance Plan (APP) were discussed and prioritised for implementation for the Supply Chain Management (SCM).

Ms Ramphaka said that she was not sure if she would present all the information because all quarter-three performance targets were achieved and results were at 100%. She added that the internal audit department had assured the ARC, following a report that was presented to it, that the statistics were correct and the targets were achieved. The internal audit department looked at supporting documentation for quarter three. She wanted to mention this in case she did not get a chance to present the quarter-three report.

She further added that these were the main reasons for underspending in the Department at the time. When it comes to financial management, the Chief Financial Officer (CFO) was quite heavily involved. She was always present to hear the ARC recommendations and to execute what needs to be actioned so that spending can be in line with what was expected – so that the programmes and the targets of the Department were all up to date.

Ms Ramphaka said that the information that she had to give for quarter three will have some aspects that will have to be added, but this is what was to be reported for quarter two, for now. The Department still has quarters three and four to catch up with spending on programmes that were behind.

Irregular, fruitless and wasteful expenditure

The Department did not incur irregular expenditure during the second quarter. The transaction relating to the procurement of branding material for the Department was referred to internal audit for the determination of facts as part of the investigation process.

ARC recommendation on irregular expenditure

All irregular transactions to be reviewed must be referred to internal audit so that they can be validated. In relation to this year up to the point of irregular expenditure, the ARC was comfortable with the Department making an effort to prevent irregular expenditure and to prevent fruitless and wasteful expenditure.

[cut in audio 25:14 – 28:00]

Ms Ramphaka told the Committee that, out of 120 planned interviews, 94 were conducted, and 34 were not conducted due to the following reasons:

  • One officials’ contract ended
  • Two finance officials’ were on maternity leave
  • Five officials resigned
  • One official’s interview was going to take place in January 2022 and the recourse analysis was to commence in January 2022.

Even on this point, there was no root-cause analysis, and some interviews had not taken place.

The Chairperson asked what it will take to complete investigations.

Ms Ramphaka said that the ARC requested that management put in more resources so that investigations can be completed because there was one person doing it at the time. The ARC was not satisfied that there was sufficient progress or at least to the expectations that it had. So it requested more resources to finish this work because without all of this it cannot get to consequence management, which is the ultimate goal it was trying to achieve. Therefore, it wanted acceleration of the plan by investing more resources to conduct these activities.

She said that, as the meeting progresses, she is sure that she will cover more of what the ARC’s views were on these transactions and the progress of the investigation of irregular expenditure.

In the 2016/17 financial year, there were 60 transactions; 41 payment batches were received and reviewed and 19 were outstanding. There were some issues with the registers, so management had been requested by the internal audit department to re-submit the register. But in relation to the 60 transactions, interviews were still in progress.

The Chairperson interjected, saying that she was trying to think about and digest what had been said. She said that she was asking herself whether there was any suggestion of how the Department can get more resources because there is a limited budget.

Ms Ramphaka responded and said that, at the time, the activity was performed by a temporary contract worker, so the request was to consider getting another contract worker to assist the Department. The ARC asked management to look at the resources, and the Department does have savings in certain budget items. Therefore, the ARC suggested that it used those savings to get resources to assist with this exercise.

The Chairperson agreed that the Department had contract workers, but this was not a long-term solution. The problem that the Portfolio Committee had was that it was not clear how these contract workers were appointed and recruited. The other problem was that the Department creates the impression that it will employ these contract workers permanently because once you gave someone a six-month contract and extended it, it meant that the person will be employed permanently. So, the whole process of how human resources contracts people was the one thing that the Committee had identified as being flawed, and it was raised in one of the previous meetings. In the last meeting, the ARC presented a report and the then chairperson was part of the meeting. This was one of the issues that were raised.

Ms Ramphaka said that there were some structures that were proposed and developed, which management will speak further about it terms of where they were in the development process. However, there were new structures put together, and she asked management to clarify how far it was with those structures. She told the Committee that she would rather have management report on the proposed structures in terms of where the Department was with the approval processes.

The employment of contract workers was an intermediary action just to make sure that this work continued while the structures were being approved and going through the processes for implementation. Management will report back to the Portfolio Committee regarding this in detail.

The Chairperson said that she hoped management had listened to the question because it would need to respond to it.

With respect to the 2016/17 irregular transactions, Ms Ramphaka told the Committee that the interviews were still in progress and were scheduled to be completed in January 2022. Thereafter, the root-cause analysis would commence, and a report would then be compiled. The Department indicated that it made progress with the interviews, and there was a plan to complete them at the end of January 2022, do some root-cause analysis following the interviews and then compile a report by mid-February 2022. The report would then be taken through legal for validation, then to the DG for consequence management.

Concern from the ARC was that the slow progress on the determination of facts adversely affected implementation of consequence management as well as the possible condonation of the irregular expenditure, which currently sat in the financial statements. The slow progress was affecting the consequence management and condonation of irregular expenditure. The ARC indicated that management must intervene to establish the slow progress at the time.

Another concern that the ARC raised was that registers of the prior years could not be located in the Department and this was flagged as a potentially contentious issue because if the irregular expenditure registers could not be found, then the investigation cannot take place and all the other processes cannot follow.

Ms Ramphaka told the Committee that the ARC requested that, as a proactive measure, the Department should seek advice from National Treasury (hereafter referred to as Treasury) on the way forward regarding the misplaced irregular expenditure registers so that it can know what to do right away, while the registers were looked for.

The ARC recommended that the Department should consider alternative ways of locating the registers, such as checking with the Auditor-General of South Africa (AGSA) to see if it had record of the registers in its audit files. It also recommended that the determination of facts exercise be sufficiently resourced. After looking at some of the potential challenges that could ensue from this process, the committee asked management to be proactive by engaging Treasury because, if the Department cannot find the registers and some of the batches, then this exercise will come to a standstill. It does not want to reinitiate these processes later because it wants to know what the course of action will be while the registers and batches were being looked for.

It was indicated that this information could have been lost when the system crashed some time ago. Ms Ramphaka told the Committee that she was unsure how much it knows about the crash, but there was information that was lost in that process.

Reported deviation and payment of invoices within 30 days

  • The only invoice that was paid after 30 days was from the previous year. What delayed the payment was an exercise to determine whether the transaction was irregular or not.

Ms Ramphaka told the Committee that the ARC was happy with the Department and how it tried to stick to the 30 days turnaround time for the payment of invoices.

The Chairperson asked Ms Ramphaka if the reason that the Department had given for the late payment of the invoice was satisfactory to the ARC. She questioned the reason given to the ARC by the Department for the invoice that was paid after 30 days. She said that the late payment was unfair to the service provider and that the answer given by the Department was extremely unsatisfactory.

Ms Ramphaka told the Committee that this was an isolated incident, and that management should determine this irregularity quickly so that the Department can still pay the invoice. She also said that there was hesitation on the Department’s side to act too quickly when it came to the payment of invoices. However, she agreed that the process can be improved so that the invoices can still be paid. Once the details of the invoice were established, let it be paid. The irregularity can be looked at fairly quickly with internal audit.

The Chairperson explained to the ARC that the other reason why she was raising the issue as something that was not on and should be addressed urgently was because the Committee had been getting complaints from service providers that departments and municipalities were not paying them on time, because officials handling the finances want to be paid kickbacks first before they process the invoices of a company. Further, the answer that the Department gave cannot be correct and accepted.

Ms Ramphaka noted the Chairperson’s concern and said that she will ask the CFO to comment on that particular point before the end of the presentation, as the CFO was in a better position to answer with more facts.

Ms N Ntlangwini (EFF) asked for clarity on this point, noting that Ms Ramphaka had provided reasons for the 30 days payment and its validity. She was extremely concerned that even now there was a delay in paying service providers, majority of them being small scale businesses. How was the Department going to ensure that this did not continue to occur - the Department cannot not be paying service providers just because it does not want irregular statements on the audit findings. According to what Ms Ramphaka said, the Department must still go check the validity of invoices before paying them out. This was not right and illegal. Service providers must be paid before the 30 days period is over.

Ms Ntlangwini said that, if she heard correctly, Ms Ramphaka said that if the service providers were paid immediately, there will be irregular expenditure in the audit findings and not on the audit statement. She asked to be corrected if she had heard incorrectly or misunderstood what was said.

Ms Ramphaka responded to Ms Ntlangwini and explained that, at the end of the second quarter, all invoices were paid within 30 days and only one invoice was paid after 30 days because there was an issue around the invoice that she would like the CFO to talk to. There was only one invoice that had this particular issue. However, the CFO will have more information about what really transpired. This was not a practice that the ARC was seeing a lot of. Exceptions to the 30-day rule arise because of the determination of irregular expenditure. Ms Ramphaka reiterated that the CFO will give more details because she did not want it to appear as if the Department was not paying in general because of irregular expenditure. This was just an exception, and the Committee will hear more details about this exception and what actually happened in this case. The 30-day rule was followed even in the third quarter, and the ARC had not observed a lot of issues related to this. The CFO will explain the reasons for the deviations from the norm. She asked if it this was acceptable to Ms Ntlangwini.

Ms Ntlangwini said that everything was understood.

ARC recommendation on deviations

  • The recommendation stands that valid invoices must be paid within 30 days and those deviations must be justifiable to ensure that the law was complied with.

The Chairperson said that the Committee understood the law in terms of virements and deviations. However, she expected that the risk committee would have a strong recommendation regarding the issue of invoices because it had to do with budget monitoring; and the Committee was expecting the Department to start by checking all these details when it did its planning. Looking at the fact that there were so many virements and deviations, one had many questions as to whether there was capacity or not because it cannot be correct. In all these problems, the Department made virements; why was that? When the Department did its planning and sets targets, was the CFO not part of all that planning?

Ms Ramphaka agreed with the Chairperson and explained that the ARC unfortunately did not include the list of deviations, but the majority of deviations that the Committee had been coming across were for the appointment of sole service providers. So, it was mainly the appointment of sole service providers versus emergency transactions. This is what the ARC had seen in this period. They were not emergencies where there was no planning. Most of them were coming through from service providers, which were allowed for in the law if certain criteria were met.

She said that management can comment on the virements that the Chairperson spoke about earlier, and the types of deviations observed from the Department. There was a time when there were many planning issues or emergency types of transactions, but in this period, the ARC had not seen many of them like before. Again, the CFO would be the best person to comment. The AGSA and the ARC, at some point, used to go through the list of deviations and analyse what was coming through, in order to understand. They would ask internal audit to go through the paperwork with the AG just to comment on the validity of the deviations that were coming through from the Department. There had since been a reduction in was reported. At least that was what the ARC got from the management report.

Reported progress on the implementation of the audit action plan

Ms Ramphaka told the Committee that some of the issues that were part of the audit plan had still not been implemented. The Department had a new ICT person since mid-year, and its hope was in the processes taking place between the new ICT Head and the strategic ICT Committee that has been formed and was chaired by an external person, who would then advise the Department to ensure that all IT risks and activities take place as planned. The ARC had been getting a report back through the chairperson of the strategic committee. She knew that there were resource and human resource constraints in the ICT Department. The operational committee was not yet established but the strategic committee was established. This committee was chaired by an official from another department to assist DWYPD with the ICT matters. At this point, the progress was also not satisfactory.

Information Communication Technology

  • Major funding was required for ICT to proceed as expected.
  • ICT continued to experience challenges of inadequate financial resources as well as human resources.

Ms Ramphaka ended her presentation on slide 14 due to not having any more time available. In conclusion, she addressed the Committee saying that she hoped her message was loud, clear and acceptable to the Committee.

The Chairperson thanked Ms Ramphaka and raised that in the presentation, she spoke about the reliability of the sanitary dignity implementation. She did not understand what Ms Ramphaka said, and asked for clarity.

Ms Ramphaka said that this was an old issue that the ARC had where it was concerned about how reliable the performance information of the sanitary dignity programme was. Internal audit also questioned the compilation and how reliable information on the programme was. The action that management took was that the information submitted by provinces should be signed off by the delegated senior official in the respective provinces. She told the Committee that the Department was in the best position to give more details on that whole process and the initial issues encountered with that information. For some reason, there was an issue of reliability, but it was an old issue that the ARC just wanted to deal with properly and this was the commitment made.

Discussion

Ms F Masiko (ANC) requested to reserve her questions until after the Department had given its presentation because her questions will be directed to the Department rather than to the chairperson of the ARC.

The Chairperson proposed questions be reserved for after the Department completed its presentation.

The Committee agreed.

Addressing the DG, the Chairperson indicated that there were some issues that needed to be ironed out before she could start with her presentation. The Chairperson requested that all officials responsible for the different programmes must be the ones to respond to all the questions that the Committee had. The role of the DG in this presentation was simply to deliver the overall presentation. The Committee was concerned because it had seen many things in the report. As such, it was not clear if this was a question of sabotage or not.

The Chairperson told the DG that the Committee would like to put forward its questions directly to the managers responsible for certain programmes. There were instances where targets were being achieved but the spending of money did not correlate with what was supposed to be spent. To make matters worse, the Committee had been complaining to Treasury about the small allocations made to the Department. The Committee had advocated for the Department to receive more funding. This will lead to Treasury not taking the Committee seriously. Treasury could see that the Department did not need more funds because of the expenditure trends. The manner in which money was being allocated to the Department’s project and problems was questionable, after listening to the ARC chairperson’s presentation.

The Chairperson emphasised that certain questions must be answered by the Department’s management according to what was spent. This was not the only financial year where the Committee witnessed so many virements, which was unacceptable. The Committee knew for certain that there were emergency times where the Department can apply for virements, but it cannot continue every financial year. This raised the question of whether there was capacity or not. How did the Department function without a Procurement Officer? Why were there posts being kept vacant within the Department for a long time?

There were matters that the Committee had noted as critical points. For instance, when the Committee looked at the report that the Department had submitted, how did it, as a National Department, submit a four-page report for people living with disabilities? When the Committee looked at the analysis of Monitoring and Evaluation (M&E) of other departments, the way in which the report was drafted and submitted to the Committee did not say anything. What the Committee was expecting was an in-depth report that will explain what M&E was done in other departments.

The Chairperson told the DG that the Committee was expecting that when the Department did its analysis and reported back on the things it had monitored and checked in those departments, those details will be clear. For example, if the DWYPD did an analysis of the Department of Mineral and Resources and Energy (DMRE), it will tell the Committee if women were benefitting from that department. To say that the department in question had a budget for women says nothing to the Committee. All the Committee wanted to see was that women, youth and people with disabilities were benefitting from these departments and how much was being allocated and spent on them. If this was not clear in the report, it meant nothing to the Committee. What was clear in the report for the Committee to see was that the Department was just ticking boxes – the Committee needed to see more than this, especially because this was a Department that needed to monitor if all other departments were implementing and mainstreaming all these functions.

The Chairperson asked the DG to proceed with the Department’s presentation.

Adv. Maluleke reassured the Committee that its concerns were noted and that the Department will respond to them as it went through the presentation. She assured the Committee the Department was improving, slowly but surely. The Department as it was today cannot be compared to what it was two or three years back. There was rapid improvement. There were many challenges, but the Department was mitigating them by trying all it can and implementing what needed to be implemented, despite the fact that it was structured the way it was. The structure of the Department talked to the budget. If there was only one person in the internal audit then the Department cannot function the way it was supposed to. Having one Director and one Deputy Director means that, when the Deputy Director was on maternity leave for four months or sometimes even longer, there were many challenges that will arise as a result of being left with one person to handle everything. There were many challenges that the Department was trying to address, but it did not mention some of those to the Committee. One of those challenges was that, within government, it faces challenges such as the Department’s structure not being confirmed as yet by the Department of Public Service and Administration (DPSA) and Treasury. The Department was still operating under the interim structure from the time when the youth and disabilities portfolios were brought to the Department because people who were supposed to confirm the structures did not understand the role of the Department. This was a challenge that the DWYPD encountered most of the time.

One day the DWYPD will be told to do this then the next told to do that because nobody knows what the Department is supposed to do. It became a challenge because the structure that would enable the DWYPD to deliver was not there. What Department had done, with the assistance of the European Union (EU), was to procure four people per province, for three provinces: Gauteng, KwaZulu-Natal (KZN) and Eastern Cape. These people will be placed in these provinces to assist with data collection and training on gender mainstreaming, gender responsiveness and implementation of the National Strategic Plan (NSP). These people were placed in these provinces to collect information for the Committee. This was so that, when the Department appeared before it, it can say “in Gauteng two or three per cent” and also provide stats that were based on accurate information. At the moment, the Department was relying on information that was sent through to it. In some instances, someone will send a PowerPoint report, while someone else will send a mere two-pager. So, the information that the Department receives was not standardised. Because of this inconsistency, she was failing to please the Committee. 

The Chairperson interjected and assured the DG that she was not failing because the Committee can see that the Department was trying. She explained to the DG the importance of raising issues allowed the Department to see where it was improving. The Committee can see where the Department was progressing and where there were still shortcomings or a gap. In this case, the Committee will alert the Department to such because it was the responsibility of the Committee to do that in its oversight role and to advise the Department on things that it should be doing. This thing of government not understanding exactly what the Department’s core business and mandate was something that must be fast-tracked by the DG because she is able to do it and had the capacity to do it. The DG needed to make an effort to make these things happen.

If the Department DG was not enforcing and ensuring that the departments were implementing what needed to be implemented, became a cause for concern. Where there was a need for legislation, let it be fast-tracked. The Chairperson also suggested that the Department must propose legislation because, in some instances, it became difficult to monitor the private sector, which then created the impression that the Department’s reach was only limited to the public sector. What about the private sector where there were many things happening? It became a problem for the Committee. At the end of this administration, the Committee should be able to show what the Department achieved. But if it will be business as usual, that meant that both the Committee and the Department have reached the ceiling and cannot think out of the box. The Committee wants the Department to move from where it was. It was evident to the Committee that progress was being made because the last time the Department appeared before it, the Department presented that it wanted to take on the role of being a regulator - these were the things that the Committee was keen on seeing happening. It must not just be on paper but must be implemented.

Adv. Maluleke reported that even the officials in the Department were moving with her at a steady pace, and their attitude and zeal were improving. The goal that they were all moving toward was ensuring that the Department achieved 100% of its annual targets, that there was no irregular expenditure, and that women, youth and persons with disabilities in South Africa benefit. If the Department functions well it will be able to impact all other government departments, and women and persons with disabilities will benefit from this.

Briefing by the Department of Women, Youth and Persons with Disabilities on Q2 and 3

Looking at Part A of the presentation, which was titled Strategic Focus and Programme Achievements as per Second Quarter Performance Information Report, Adv Maluleke said that the strategic focus of the Department was to reflect on the previous two quarters, realising that it did not achieve in the second quarter. However, in the third quarter, as indicated by the chairperson of the ARC, the Department achieved its intention to maintain that outcome. The DG said it was important to bear in mind that some things were not dependent on the DWYPD. There were instances where it depended on approval from other departments, and DWYPD had no control over this. The Department was hoping that it will, once again, achieve a 100% outcome in quarter four as a result of the process that it had introduced – holding quarterly-performance review meetings, which Adv Maluleke chaired, to assess the performance and commitment of the Department and ensure that it worked towards achieving a clean audit.

In quarter two, the Department found that there were targets that were not achieved in both the administration programmes and core business. During discussions, it became evident that some members of management still believe someone will come to do their work for them. Adv. Maluleke said that the Department management reflected on the targets that were not achieved and the reasons for deviation, which led to shifting the goal post in most instances. There were many times when it was found that one would not shy away from blaming the supply chain. She admitted that she was guilty of same too. However, this came back to what was said previously. The Department currently has six people in Supply Chain Management (SCM): two in Administration, two Assistant Directors and one Director. Sometimes, it happens that one is on maternity leave or sick, etc. Management took the time to compare the Department with the Department of Planning, Monitoring and Evaluation (DPME) simply because these two departments are alike, even though the DWYPD has a bigger mandate. In its SCM department, DPME had 24 people and its workload focused on government only. It did not focus on the private sector or on any international reporting. DPME did not work with civil society nor the Department of Employment and Labour, whereas DWYPD had to work with all of the above.

Even though this was the case, the DG said that the Department took a stance to say that it will not wait for SCM. Its prerogative was to consider alternatives to achieve the work set out for it. The DWYPD’s SCM was 30% of DPME’s yet its work was 400% greater than DPME’s.

In quarter three, however, the overall performance was 100%, in relation to the set targets. The Department worked backwards to ensure targets were achieved. The status on targets that were not achieved in quarter two looked good and the DWYPD was working tirelessly to ensure it achieved the planned annual targets.

Programme One: Administration

The draft Master Information Technology Strategy and Plan (MITSP), which previously was not achieved, was submitted to the ICT strategic committee for consultation during 15-22 December 2021. The MITSP project plan was monitored by the committee on a quarterly basis, and the target will be finalised at the end of quarter four.

Programme Two: Social Transformation and Economic Empowerment

The inception report on the development of socio-economic empowerment index developed was not achieved in quarter two. The inception was produced and achieved in quarter three.

Programme Three: Intervention to support social empowerment and participation of women, youth and persons with disabilities

Intervention to support social empowerment was also not achieved in quarter two. It was achieved in quarter three. Visits were made to five schools in the Alfred Nzo District, in the Eastern Cape. Enquiry sessions were held with Life Orientation teachers to identify practical challenges in the teaching of age-appropriate comprehensive sexuality education in South African public schools.  Within the subject of Life Orientation, menstruation and sexual reproduction health-right issues were taught. Interaction also took place between the Department and learners.

Programme Four: Development of the Socio-Economic Impact Assessment Study Report

The development of the National Gender Framework was not achieved. The essence of programme four was to ensure that the SEIAS report was developed. The Department was exempted from submitting the initial SEIAS report because it was reviewing an existing policy, and this had since been achieved. The final SEIAS report will be submitted when the policy amendment were finalised.

Programme Five: NYDA Amendment Bill processed to Parliament

The NYDA Amendment Bill was not achieved during quarter two, but in quarter three - it was submitted to Cabinet for approval.

Ms Val Mathobela, Chief Director: Strategic Management, confirmed that the report had been submitted to the Committee for perusal prior to the meeting. Governance was the root report not being submitted because of how the Department experienced ICT challenges when sending reports. She confirmed to the Committee that the Department will make it available for quarter two.

In quarter two, there were targets that were achieved and some that were not. Those that were not achieved during that quarter were achieved in quarter three, as indicated by the chairperson of the ARC and the DG. In programme one, there was only one target that was not achieved; in programme two it was two targets. The target related to the review of the National Gender Policy Framework in programme three was also not achieved. The Presidency endorsed and issued a SEIAS report in quarter three, and so the target was fully achieved.

The target of the NYDA Amendment Bill being tabled in Parliament was not achieved in quarter two, but it was processed in Cabinet. This was progress made in quarter three. The Department was now at a point where all targets were achieved 100% in quarter three.

Human Resource Management Report

Part D of the report was led by Mr Mbhazima Shiviti, Chief Director: Resource Management.

Departmental Financial Report

Ms Desree Legwale, Chief Financial Officer, told the Committee that funds that were shifted from core programmes were mainly the potential savings that management identified in relation to the budget that was set aside for international travel. The travel did not take place, as anticipated by the Department, due to the Covid-19 travel restrictions.

Programme One: Administration

The breakdown of the allocation for the seven vehicles that were procured was as follows:

  • Two cars were allocated to Cape Town for the two protectors.
  • Two cars were allocated in Pretoria for the two protectors.
  • One car was allocated to the messenger in Ministry
  • One car was allocated for the use of departmental officials.
  • The Department procured a kombi that will be used to transport officials during departmental events.

Ms Legwale told the Committee that the Department observed that, in most cases, when there were departmental events and officials were delegated to a facility for the coordination of an event, a car would have to be hired through the Department’s travel management company. Officials that used their own private vehicles were paying for SMT, and this had reduced the cost of travel for events of the Department.

Programme Two: Social Transformation and Economic Empowerment (STEE)

When the Department had capacity challenges and was faced with the inability to deliver on some of its activities due to external factors beyond the control of the Department, it will approach agencies like the United Nations (UN) that assist with support at no cost to the Department.

Programme Five: National Youth Development

The Department was able to successfully pay the R1.5 million in the subsequent quarters.

Irregular, fruitless and wasteful expenditure

The only irregular expenditure incurred by the Department related to the transaction discussed earlier in the meeting. The officials responsible for this transaction were sensitised on the importance of honouring the payment of valid supplier invoices within the 30 day period. This was not only shared with the officials responsible for this transaction, but also with all officials in SCM and finance, involved with the payment of invoices within the Department.

A total of 2 600 invoices were paid up to the end of December 2021. This was the only expenditure carried over from the 2020 financial year that was paid outside of the 30-day period.

Discussion

The Chairperson said, during his presentation, Mr Shiviti had reported that there were four officials that had resigned. Which positions did these officials resign from, and in which provinces did these resignations take place? Referring back to what was said earlier, she reminded the DG that the Committee was concerned about the issue around contract workers.  The concern was that the Department was creating expectations of permanent employment when it appointed contract workers for a certain period. What made the situation worse in the case of the Department was that it retained contract workers for more than six months. Was the Department not putting itself in an awkward situation whereby, at the end of the day, it will be taken to the Labour Court by employees because of these expectations being created? Why was the Department doing that? The country had many young graduates that can be employed as contract workers but it seemed the Department kept using the same people. This was an issue that the Committee strongly felt the Department should look at closely and explain exactly how contract workers were appointed. Mr Shiviti was asked to respond.

Another issue that the Committee had was that of security. There had been an official that was removed from IT because of a situation involving him. As a result, that official was placed in security. What was going on with that case? Why was it that with these cases it appeared as if the Department was “playing tennis”, with the matters being hit back and forth? Why were these cases not being finalised? Why were there still outstanding cases to date? How far was the case of the Deputy Director-General (DDG)?

The Chairperson asked that before Members contribute with clarity-seeking questions or comments, the DG tell the Committee about CSW for this year. What was going to happen around it, and what was the feedback, if any, regarding the child marriage protocol? Was there progress in that regard or not? Over and above that, the DG was asked to give feedback on all outstanding matters that she was aware of – even those not specifically mentioned.

Ms C Phiri (ANC) wished the Minister a speedy recovery and asked the Chairperson if it would be possible for a message to be sent on behalf of the Committee.

She noted that, in quarter three, under fraud and corruption, ‘risk performance’ fraud and recommendations were outlined and reported on. Some were partially implemented while some were not implemented at all. In those fraud and corruption cases mentioned, there was an issue of ghost employees. To her understanding, this would mean that employees would not be at work and not be on leave, which fell under fraud – specifically payment fraud. Others have been put under investigation or had disciplinary actions taken against them. At the same time, the report also showed that not all of them underwent the same process. Why was there partial implementation in this regard?

In quarter three, there was a high amount of deviations that amounted to about R1.5 million. This deviation amount is too much. As much as the law allowed for deviations, there must be a further detailed explanation that the Department would need to provide to the Committee. It may not be immediate but it had to be something that the Department sent by way of a report.

Again, in quarter three, under the research report and development of the socio-economic index, the report showed that there was a target achievement in the target development of the same report and research. What was the socio-economic empowerment index, currently?

The Chairperson logged out of the meeting due to network issues.

Ms F Masiko (ANC) raised concern regarding the issue of the Chief Director for Advocacy and Mainstreaming, in terms of the rights of people with disabilities. In previous meetings, it was reported that the Department could not provide a detailed response to the matter as it still awaited the findings and recommendations of the Public Service Commission enquiry, which was commissioned by DPSA. It was reported that the external complainant had recently withdrawn its complaint, which was with the bargaining council. Had the Department received the PSC report on the enquiry that was commissioned by DPSA? If not, why was the report not submitted? If it was submitted, what was the outcome and what was the way forward with the report? The Committee needed a briefing on this.

The second question related to the status of the DDG for Corporate Services position, which was a matter that had been briefly highlighted by the Chairperson. The Committee had previously discussed the matter. In the last meeting, the Department discouraged any further discussions on the matter pending the outcome of all court processes. The DG raised that it would have been advisable for the complainant to exhaust all internal disciplinary processes – which had not been done.

Ms Masiko informed the Department that the Committee had sought and received legal advice regarding the matter because it was within the oversight role of the Committee to ask questions and be briefed in relation to the matter. She asked that the Department give the Committee a progress report update regarding how it went about resolving the matter of the DDG for Corporate Services.

Regarding the use of service providers to conduct internal evaluations of the Department, the Committee understood that DPME had little capacity to conduct the evaluation. This then left the Department with little choice but to use outside service providers to conduct the internal monitoring or evaluation of the Department.

The Committee felt the need to re-emphasise the risk associated with the reliance on outside service providers, as this was mentioned several times before in all meetings of the Committee. There was a risk associated with service providers executing what the Committee viewed as core internal responsibilities of the Department, such as report writing, organisational strategic planning and research.

The Committee always encouraged the Department to focus on mitigating factors. The question now was what was done to ensure the Department had the internal capacity to conduct the evaluation.

Does the Department have a website? A simple yes or no would suffice.

The DG responded that the Department does have a website, and confirmed that the website had been up and running since December 2021.

Ms Masiko then asked Adv. Maluleke for the website address to check if the website was functional.

The DG said that if the website did not work, it will be because of the State Information Technology Agency (SITA). The website address is www.dwypd.gov.za

Ms Masiko advised the Chairperson that she will return with a follow up question should there be issues with the functionality of the website.

The Chairperson asked the DG to forward the website address to the Committee Secretary.

In relation to the Department’s underspending, Ms Masiko noted that there were a couple of reasons \ given for the underspending. How was the Department ensuring it spent the allocated budget within the 2021/22 financial year? Part of the reasons recorded for the underspending was that there were delays in the procurement of laptops as well as stationery, and also delays in finalising procurement and installation of Microsoft licenses and the Department website. Why had it taken nine months to finalise the procurement of laptops and stationery? How have employees that did not have laptops been functioning, especially because the current times required the use of Zoom platforms where one needed working tools such as laptops?

The other issue noted in the report was that the procurement of office stationery did not occur as planned, as most people were working from home. Did people working from home not require stationery? How were these people expected to work and function if they had not been given the necessary working tools?

Another reason noted for underspending was the delay in making the necessary transfers to the National Youth Development Agency (NYDA). It was said that the Department awaited clear-standing plans from NYDA before approval of the adjustment. Had the Department used such reasons for not releasing funds to the NYDA or the CGE because it wanted clear-standing plans? What did the Department mean by ‘clear-standing plans’? Did the NYDA need to submit them each quarter or did it have to submit them at the beginning of each financial year? It was picked up that the transfer will be done in January 2022. Given that it is now February 2022, had this transfer been made to the NYDA?

In relation to office accommodation, the report detailed how underspent funds will be directed to cover the expenditure of the relocation to the new building, including (but not limited to) the procurement of the removal company, the installation payment, ICT infrastructure installation, security installation and the branding of the Department.

Ms Masiko said this was the first time she heard of the Department moving office. Where was it relocating to? What was the cost incurred in terms of the lease agreement? Why was the Department relocating? Were the current offices not suitable to accommodate the Department? Will all the programmes be housed in one building? What was the timeframe for this move? Was it an immediate activity, given the movement of funds?

The Chairperson told Ms Masiko that the website was not working unless there was a different address.

Another Member told the Chairperson that the website was working.

Ms Masiko congratulated the DG for having a website that was up and running but made no secret of how disappointing it was that the Committee was just finding out about the website. How did the Department plan to let the public know that it can use the website to interact with the Department? The Department’s constituencies, which were women, youth and persons with disabilities, have not received this information that they were able to further interact with the Department through the website.

The Chairperson suggested that the Department put this information on the government website, where most department websites can be found. She told Ms Masiko that the issue relating to the Department’s offices had always been there. She reminded her that the lease contract expired, so there was a need for the Department to work together with the Department of Public Works and Infrastructure (DPWI) regarding the issue of finding new office space. It was the Committee that suggested the Department work together with the DPWI rather than appointing a service provider to look for an office. She asked that the DG just give an update on the office issue.

The DG explained that the DPWI was impeding the Department from finding another property. When she met with the Committee, it complained about the high cost of the building where the Department was previously located. At the time, when she spoke to the Chairperson, she did not understand but upon further investigation, the DG discovered that the rent was indeed too high; the building was small and could not accommodate the whole Department.

In the persons with disabilities unit, not all staff members were able to work in the office because it could not accommodate all of them. The youth unit also could not work in the building because there were not enough offices, but the rent was high despite all these factors. The Department started to look for a new building before the lease expired. However, DPWI would always give excuses, and the Department did not want to continue using the building for the following reasons:

- The rent was too high, and the building was not accommodating everybody.

- Staff was not coming to the office, not because of COVID-19 but because there was no office space. By the time COVID-19 hit South African shores, staff were already working from home.

The Department could not continue with that kind of situation. As a result, it managed to get a building that was meant for veterans. The veterans did not want the building and so the DDG from DWPI contacted the DWYPD DG to view the building. If she liked it, the Department could have the building. The office was situated in central town. Most people were not happy that it was in central town, but the Department thought it will be okay. The rent was 37% less than the rent paid before. The Department would be saving 63% on rent. This put the Department in a position to make a request to Treasury to redirect those funds to personnel. The hope was that Treasury will agree. The Department will save a lot of money, and, at the end of the day, everyone will have an office to work from. The building was situated in central town opposite the State Theatre.

Ms N Sharif (DA) asked the Chairperson for permission to raise an issue regarding the website before the meeting continued.

The Chairperson said it would be best to first conclude the matter of the building first before moving on. Thereafter, she will come back to Ms Sharif and give her a chance to voice her concerns.

She commended the Department for what it had done in terms of securing a new building. The amount that was being paid for the previous building was exorbitant. The fact that the Department had been able to secure a user-friendly building that accommodated everyone and was cheaper was indeed very progressive. This was a job well done by the Department.

Ms Sharif congratulated the Department for having a website but said that there were two issues that she picked up relating to the website. When doing a simple Google search of the DWYPD, the website did not come up. What did come up was the National Government website. On that website, the link there gave the following address for the Department www.women.gov.za . The main website URL had not been changed on the National Government website.

This is concerning because, if communities search for the Department online, they will not be able to find it because (1) it did not come up on Google search and (2) it had not been changed on the main governmental website.

The Chairperson told the DG that whoever was responsible for that must take note and correct it so that the Department can easily be found and accessed through the online platforms.

The DG said that she will ask someone in communications to join the meeting so that they can answer the questions on the website.

Ms A Hlongo (ANC) told the DG that she had questions about Programme Five: Youth Development. Was there any public participation on the NYDA Amendment Bill? If so, what was the feedback from civil society? What was the outcome of the NYDA quarterly report and what had it produced? What were the outcomes of the NYDA missionary meeting convened in quarter three? And lastly, what is the status of the NYDA Bill?

For constituency work, when it came to children living with disabilities that were not in school, what role did the Department play, because this also fell under the disabilities portfolio of the Department. It was heartbreaking to see children in different townships roam the street because they were not admitted to school. These children end up in crèche and did not advance any further than that. What was the role of the Department in this regard, besides the role of the Department of Basic Education?

Addressing the DG, the Chairperson asked if she had seen the Human Rights Commission report, regarding the case of disabled persons in the North West province.

The DG said she had not seen it and will request Ms Phuti Mabelebele to respond to the question.

The Chairperson said that it was important for the Department to get that report. She also confirmed that she forwarded a letter from a parent with a child living with disabilities that needed assistance. She asked the Committee Secretary if the letter was sent.

The Secretary confirmed that it had been sent to the office of the DG.

The Chairperson asked the DG if she had received it and if she can give feedback regarding that.

The Chairperson said the issue of affording children living with disabilities an opportunity to learn, whether it be at mainstream or special needs schools, was a burning issue of late.  The Committee had been receiving many complaints related to this issue. The person responsible for disability within the Department will have to respond to all the issue raised by Ms Hlongo, including this one.

The DG reported to the Committee that, though the letter that was forwarded to her, there was a request that the Department should write to the South Africa Human Rights Commission (SAHRC). In response to that request, the Department said that it will not only consider the SAHRC but will explore other areas to respond to the letter. The Department made a few requests to some business people to adopt the child. When questions relating to children with disabilities come up, those were all diverted to Ms Mabelebele.

Last year, when the Department had meetings with the Departments of Health, Social Development (DSD) and DBE, the issue of equipment needed to support children with disabilities was extensively discussed. The agreement was that there will be a meeting with all the heads of the three departments in all nine provinces.

Ms Phuti Mabelebele, Chief Director: Advocacy and Mainstreaming Rights, DWYPD, reported back to the Committee about the programme that the Department had with the DBE and the two-day summit it hosted last year.

The Department, in partnership with the DBE, held an inclusive education summit late in 2021 and at the top of the agenda for the summit was the issue of children with disabilities not being in school, including children with autism. As part of the discussion, there was consideration of the White Paper identifying the challenges that still existed that prevent children with disabilities from accessing schools. The Department emphasised the notion of inclusive education because it wanted DBE to ensure that some learners with disabilities were accommodated in mainstream schools. Because of the inclusive education approach, there was key success noted after the summit, one of which was that DBE immediately took steps in various provinces to ensure that a call for children with disabilities to be released to schools is made as soon as the school calendar year starts.

Something else that the Department was able to identify through the summit was the issue of assessments. DBE made the Department aware of the many challenges it encountered related to the assessment of children with disabilities. DBE requested Occupational Therapist (OT) specialists for the special needs schools so that they were responsible for conducting assessments of learners. This was an ongoing process, and the Department was monitoring it very carefully.

Ms Mabelebele said that over and above the summit, during the disability rights awareness month, the Department focused its attention on making a call to parents with children living with disabilities on various media platforms, including social media, to release children with disabilities for schooling. One of the challenges that still existed was that parents were still keeping children living with disabilities from school due to self-assessment. The parents have arrived, following these self-assessments, at the conclusion that their children were not yet school ready, yet some can be assisted by various schools.

Regarding children living with autism, the Department was working extensively on a programme with the autism sector. During its DRAMM programme in December 2021, the Department was able to assess and benchmark certain mechanisms being utilised by parents with children living with autism to be better understood. This was all work in progress, and the Department was working closely with DBE on the aspect of inclusive education.

Speaking about the report of the SAHRC regarding the case of disabled children in the North West, she said the Department was aware of it and had since engaged the SAHRC to look at the recommendations put forth in the report. The Department had analysed the report and had put this incident forth in the report that will go to Cabinet as one of the issues to be attended to.

The Chairperson said the Department must also get the Committee’s recommendations on what it said to the SAHRC so that those can also be included in same report.

The DG responded that most of the questions raised by Committee Members were based on quarter three, which the Department had not presented on. If the Department had presented quarter three material, maybe most of the questions would have been answered by the presentation.

She introduced Dr Praveena Sukhraj-Ely, Chief Director: Compliance, Disability Unit, who had recently joined the Department. She asked her to show her face.

Dr Sukhraj introduced herself and told the Committee that she joined the unit three weeks before the meeting and that she looked forward to serving the Department and engaging the Committee.

The Chairperson welcomed Dr Sukhraj and hoped that the official will take the issues of people living with disabilities seriously. What the Committee observed in some instances in the past was that when people were appointed in strategic positions, they became comfortable. For example, when the SAHRC was presenting its report to the Committee, it was very disappointed with one of the Commissioners who presented. The Committee reserved its comment because it did not want to say anything in the meeting. The Department was aware of the needs of persons living with disabilities and the challenges that affect them. The Committee expected that any officials in those positions will always be cognisant of this. She told Dr Sukhraj that she will play a crucial role in making sure that the issues of people living with disabilities were taken seriously and their needs were attended to. The Committee will depend on her and wished her all the best in her role.

Ms T Masondo (ANC) thanked the Department for its hard work. Given that it is a new year, the Department and Committee must join together and work hand in hand to achieve success. How had the Department progressed in terms of addressing the Medium Term Strategic Framework (MTSF) priorities for the 2021/22 financial year?

Based on the activities undertaken by the Department in the current financial year, what progress can be reported in terms of Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and Agenda 2063 as it related to women, youth and persons living with disabilities? In quarter two, there were two unmet targets, and in quarter three there were five unmet targets. Evidently, these would need to be achieved in quarter four. What intervention had the Accounting Officer secured and was this successful? What was the proposed way forward? What progress had been made to address partially implemented actions and actions not implemented? Had the internal audit capacity constraints been addressed? If not, why not? Have the recommendations by the ICT strategic committee been implemented? If not, why not? Why were non-ICT matters, as indicated by the ARC, not resolved? Why did the audit action plan reflect four findings in progress and not nine? What was the plan to address the nine ICT findings as a matter of urgency? Had consequence management been implemented against the senior ICT manager for non-delivery? If not, why not? Why did the quarter three risk management report indicate improvement in the loss of information and data management, yet the ARC identified weaknesses in relation to backup management processes and recovery management processes?

Ms Ntlangwini expressed that she had concerns connected to the ICT findings and consequence management that Ms Masondo had touched on. In today’s day and age, the majority of people’s lives depend on ICT, especially with COVID19. It was concerning that a crucial department like DWYPD was still struggling with ICT. The website had many issues, as Ms Sharif identified. It needed to be up and running properly like how a website was supposed to work. The DWYPD was an important department that needed to focus on the vulnerable – women in the main and then people living with disabilities as well as the youth. So, for a department to sit for so long without a proper website was quite concerning, and there needed to be consequences in that regard for individuals who get salaries but were not doing what they were supposed to do.

In terms of monitoring in the Department, what were the findings by the service provider that did the M&E of the DPME in quarter two and quarter three? What had the Department done to strengthen capacity in order to conduct departmental evaluations? Service providers cannot be hired all the time. The Department needed to also have internal controls to conduct M&E. As a word of warning, Ms Ntlangwini told the Department that it needed to stand on its own two feet and move away from relying on service providers. It was very irresponsible of the Department to use the state’s money in this way. There were people in the Department that can type reports but it still hired external service providers to complete the job. The Department really needed to strengthen its capacity in this regard.

Mr S Ngcobo (DA) said that his questions were based on the rights of persons with disabilities, which was programme four. Since the Department completed its reports and frameworks, how was it going to implement said frameworks? What was the implementation strategy going to be? How will the Department measure the impact of these reports and frameworks completed?

The Committee received a four-page document from the Department titled the draft status in departmental draft APPs for 2021 – 2024. Just to check with the Department, was the four-page document the total length of it, and why did the Department not send Annexure A referred to in the document?

Where was the Department in terms of developing the Disabilities Rights Bill? When can the Committee expect to receive the Bill?

Mr Ngcobo went on to express his concern about something he observed during the State of the Nation Address (SONA). The President finished his entire speech without referring to persons living with disabilities and the challenges they faced. It was only during SONA replies that he mentioned some of the challenges that persons living with disabilities faced and interventions government will make. What was the relationship between the Department and the presidential working group for disabilities, given the challenges that persons living with disabilities faced? Why would a State President, in his entire SONA speech, not say anything about persons living with disabilities, when his Cabinet had a Department that deals with persons living with disabilities?

Ms M Hlengwa (IFP) spoke about the arising issue of autism. In five schools in KwaZulu-Natal, they were fully equipped for children living with autism, one of which was in Durban. This school specialised specifically in autism. It had submitted its commitment to the Portfolio Committee of Health to be considered in the National Health Insurance (NHI). She said she would forward the document to the Chairperson so she could read up on it and become familiar with everything. She asked if it was standard procedure for the Department to appoint funeral undertakers when it had lost a staff member. She asked because she had read something about the late Deputy Minister that was cause for concern.

DWYPD responses

Regarding the official that was moved from SCM, the DG explained that there was a disciplinary hearing against him prior to the move and the presiding officer, despite the finding against this official, reinstated him. The Department applied for review of this reinstatement through the courts but the presiding officer refused to give records of the proceedings, which led to the Department taking a very long time to get the matter sorted. The process started long before the DG arrived in the Department. When Adv. Maluleke arrived at the Department, she managed to get the recording from the Prosecutor so that it can be transcribed into record. Since it was already late, the Department applied for condonation with the courts so that the decision can be reviewed because the Department felt that the decision taken by the presiding officer was not correct. The DG expressed, without going into too much detail, that the presiding officer could have been corrupted. There was a delay in having the matter set down, due to the Department of Justice and Constitutional Development (DoJ) not having a working website for close to six months because it was hacked. The matter was set down in December. The Department awaited the DoJ to give a date for the hearing.

The Chairperson reminded the DG about the whistleblower who told her that there was a report from State Security that the person occupying the position was not fit for the position.

The DG responded that the person in question was not dealing with security issues but was chairing the COVID-19 committee because it fell under security. It had been done this way so that, for now, he did not sit at home and earn a salary for nothing. This was also a query for the court because the then presiding officer disregarded the court. However, the Department was working on the matter and hoped that the court will give it a date very soon so that the matter can be dealt with.

Regarding the issue of Thandeka, as indicated before, the Department began the disciplinary process according to DPSA regulations. The first disciplinary hearing was supposed to be held on 01 December 2021 but the attorneys requested a postponement, first for February then to the end of March 2022. The presiding officer had given the dates 9 to 10 March 2022 for the disciplinary hearing to take place.

They confirmed that this time, the Department will not follow the normal procedure because most people will postpone every day or not arrive at the disciplinary hearing. So, what the Department decided to do was to deal with the matter in the same way it did on other occasions. If no one arrived when the Department went to finalise the matter, that person will fight the matter in court at their own peril. It was better that they appear when they were supposed to appear, rather than give excuses and postpone. Sometimes it was the attorneys that will be the cause of persons not appearing, by giving excuses that they were double booked. In this way, the attorneys sabotage the Department and it became questionable as to whether they were really double booked or if it was a delaying tactic. These were some of the challenges the Department dealt with.

Responding to the question of the appointment of the internal auditor, the DG explained that the appointment of the auditor was to assist the internal audit department. Upon her arrival at the Department, there was no one to assist because there were two employees in the department and one was on maternity leave. The appointment was made to provide assistance on a contract basis. However, one person was not enough, and so the Department appointed someone else. Before the appointment, a request was made to Treasury because the Department could not just go ahead and appoint people without approval and assistance of Treasury. The Department also relied on Treasury’s database for recommended people as internal audit was a highly regulated environment.

Mr Shiviti said the four officials that resigned in quarter two were:

  • Ms Ntsiki Sisulu - Chief Director / Stakeholder for the PSCKM, which is programme three;
  • Maki - Admin Officer in the office of the DDG. She also worked for the PSCKM;
  • Ms Mese – Parliamentary Officer in the office of the Deputy Minister;
  • Ms Jay Maimela – Administrative Secretary in the office of the Minister

Responding to the question regarding contract workers, Mr Shiviti explained that the Department did not have positions created specifically for contract workers. The Department appointed contract workers for positions that were open at that particular time. For example, contract workers were utilised for the internal audit because it dealt with deep investigations. Contract workers were used by the Department for labour relations, as well as to assist with drafting in legal services.

So contract workers do not necessarily have designated positions. The Department utilised the compensation of employees’ budget savings to appoint employees. There was no budget to appoint permanent employees. These contract workers were hired when there was a need, to deal with specific issues.

The Chairperson expressed some dissatisfaction at the way Mr Shiviti had replied and told him that he had not responded adequately. She reiterated the initial question that she wanted him to respond to was the duration of employment contracts, if the Department kept contract workers for more than six months and if there was an expectation being created [for permanent employment]? What were the criteria being used for appointments? Was the Department advertising for these posts or were they being filled by friends?

Ms Shiviti explained that contract workers were appointed on a three-month basis, and this appointment was reviewed every three months. If there was a saving in the employees’ compensation budget, the contract was renewed. The appointment of contract workers was regulated by the Public Service Regulations of 2016. The Regulations give the Department authority to make appointment depending on the increase in workload at that particular time.

In terms of the criteria used to appoint contract workers, the Department went via DPSA and Treasury, depending on the field where it needed people. The Department will receive CVs and proceed to interview candidates. Thereafter, recommendations were sent to the DG for approval. CVs were either sourced from Treasury, DPSA or DPME for someone who specialised in monitoring and evaluation (M&E). That was how the Department sources CVs from those databases.

Ms Mathobela spoke about the risk report that the Department submitted to the Committee as annexured. She explained that the Department identified fraud risks, and there were a total of 19 risks. It also identified mitigation action put in place to prevent risk from occurring. The questions related to fraud risk number eight: ghost employees, leave fraud and stealing Department information to sell for personal gain. Management identified mitigation actions that it must follow up on and monitor as the risk unit, to make sure they were implemented. 

In its reports, the Department will always say when mitigation actions have been implemented and when not. Actions that have not been implemented will be indicated in red and those partially implemented will be indicated by an amber arrow. The risk fraud was highlighted in red because the Department had recommended that there should be a workshop to train administrators in the Department in quarters two and three. This did not happen as recommended. The Department then went on to recommend that the latest it should be done was in quarter four, as these were people that administer leave and they must know exactly what the correct processes were to be implemented to make sure that employees account correctly for leave that they have taken.

The risk of stealing Department information for personal gain did not happen in the current financial year because the Department continued to mitigate those risks from happening. The Department discovered that, on the mitigation actions, it wanted to conduct continuous security and ICT awareness but this was not done completely. So, it recommended that, in order to fully implement these mitigation actions, it must be done in quarter four.

Ms Mathobela said she suspects that the report on disability inclusion was a report that was submitted to the Committee in the previous quarter simply because, in the current reporting periods for quarters two and three, the Department only submitted the main presentation and the annexures, along with the risk report and the programme of unachieved targets in the previous two quarters.

The Chairperson said she had noticed that Annette was now working with the DPME, and asked when she resigned. Now that Annette left the Department, who was doing its M&E?

Ms Mathobela answered that she left at the beginning of the previous financial year. When Adv. Maluleke joined the Department in 2020, DDG Annette served notice in December of the same year and resumed duties with DPME in January 2021. Ms Ranji Reddy, Acting DDG, and Chief Director, Ms Dineo Mmako, were responsible for M&E at the moment.

The Chairperson asked if the Department was going to advertise the DDG position.

The DG said the recruitment process was delayed because of the indecision of advertising the vacant PSCKM or the vacancy of head of disability, which was unfunded.  The DG said her arrival in the Department happened at a time when Treasury decided to cut the compensation of employees. However, the Department realised that PSCKM had a lot of work, and now that a Chief Director was appointed in the Disability Unit, the Department felt it might as well go ahead and advertise the DDG: Monitoring position so that it can be filled.

The Chairperson emphasised that it was important to have that vacant position filled because that was where the Department’s core business was done.

The DG replied that the Department finally agreed that this position must be advertised because it was a core position that carried a lot of responsibilities. It was even worse now that the Department managed to get a Chief Director for the Disability Unit. The post was advertised twice before being filled successfully. Now that it was filled, the M&E position can be filled.

The Chairperson said she brought the issue up again because, in her capacity as Acting DDG, Ms Reddy was responsible for international protocols. The story that was previously narrated that the Committee was the reason for the delay [of ratifying international protocols] was not a true reflection of what had happened, and that was why she wanted to raise the issue now. The Committee was against Department officials covering themselves at the expense of the Committee, when in fact they did not do their jobs as required. The protocol was delayed because the Department did not consult with other departments as required. The work done now was what was supposed to be done a long time ago. Right now it looked as if the Committee was causing the delay but this was incorrect. She thanked the DG for being proactive and told her that the Committee hoped that when it got feedback in the near future, it will be updated on how far the Department was.

Ms Shoki Tshabalala, DDG, responded to questions relating to the reliability of the sanitary dignity framework. She indicated that the internal audit findings were based on the following premise:

  • There was no consistency in the manner in which provinces were reporting back to the Department. Others were reporting by sending a PowerPoint presentation and others just by way of sending a report. Sometimes, it will not be signed. If it was signed, it will be signed off by a junior official.

The Department then revisited its quarterly reporting template, reviewed it, strengthened it and shared it with the different provinces. This was sent with a letter to the provinces to say that as of that particular month, they would be expected to report on a quarterly basis using that prescribed template, making sure that the compiler signed that report along with the next person who was senior, if not the Head of the Department. This was to ensure that, even if media or the Committee used that information, they did not turn against the Department because it will be information that was already affirmed as credible and reliable.

The internal audit report was shared with the Heads of Department and programme managers of all provinces, and the Department requested them to further share the information with their own internal units so that they too can note what the Department’s findings were, and keep a lookout on whether their offices were adhering to the proposals made.

From time to time, the Department built up its capacity framework and the sanitary dignity framework from the clear indicators, which enabled it to improve its reporting in respect of its own deliverables. That was how far the Department could go on the sanitary dignity programme.

Regarding the socio-economic empowerment index, Ms Tshabalala explained it was a measuring tool for women, youth and persons with disabilities, in respect of socio-economic empowerment. It used appropriate indicators such as budget ownership and education. This is what the Department hoped to achieve with the socio-economic index, and it will help the Department achieve further interventions and planning for government as a whole.

Regarding the secretariats appointed, the Department did not have a council as yet and it was for this reason that it was fast-tracking the National Council for Gender-Based Violence Bill. In the absence of the council, the Department was in consultation with Treasury because there was an allocation of about R5 million over the MTSF. The Department was consulting on what can be done regarding all issues that ought to be implemented by the council itself. The advice was that the Department ought to appoint this secretariat to assist the Department in implementing the NSP as an interim measure until the issues of the council were resolved. The Department once provided an explanation in that regard and a breakdown of the personnel the Department appointed in this area of work which was monitored internally by the senior officials in the Department, Treasury and DPSA.

If it were not for the appointment of the colleagues, the Department would have battled a bit with the implementation of the NST. So, it helped in a great way to enhance capacity. At this stage, the Department was quite happy with the work that the secretariat was doing. There might be areas for improvement. If there were, the Department can be made aware and will endeavour to improve. At this stage, the Department was doing its best to implement the NSP using the secretariat approved by DPSA and Treasury.

The Chairperson asked the Department if the current secretariat was able to check and fast-track the role-playing departments on whether they were implementing what was supposed to be implemented by them, according to the NSP. If the Committee needed a report on this, can be it provided? Can the Department account if the Committee was expected to report to Parliament on how far the Department was? If it had not been done, the Department must find a way to start giving redirection on how to do some of those things and by checking other role-playing departments. At the end of the day, people were looking at DWYPD, not the other departments. People look at DWYPD with closer scrutiny because it was the implementing department, and they do not understand how the workstreams were divided. It is therefore important for the Department to use its secretariat to try following up on things that need to be implemented by other departments.

Ms Tshabalala said the Department enlisted assistance under the leadership of the Chief Director, herself and Adv. Maluleke. It did the M&E framework currently in use and consulted the other departments on the indicators and targets. In the NSP itself, there are M&E frameworks which were the ones the Department was currently refining through consultation. The Department used those indicators to inform the monthly report submitted to the President. The frameworks played a critical role because, as and when departments were unable to report, the Department escalated that to the Presidency around the rate of reporting. Since they were reporting to the various clusters of the DG, the DG also attended to the performance of all the departments.

The Department had seen improvements in reporting and improved quality of reporting as opposed to what used to happen in the past. Once the M&E framework was concluded and adopted, the Department will be in a position to say: “let us give the financial framework that is binding to everyone”. This would also apply to provinces and municipalities.

Ms Sharif said that it would be great to invite the secretariat to the Committee to meet them, see who they were and find out what their work entailed, as they should be reporting to the Committee and Parliament.

The Chairperson responded that this would happen. Ms Tshabalala would be responsible for consolidating reporting on the work done by all the departments. The Committee expected a report.

Ms Tshabalala said that in the Department, the secretariats were part of its establishment and were not treated as a separate entity that can come and account on its own. They work under the supervision of the Chief Director, supported by herself. The reports were available. It was the same reports that the Department provided to the President in terms of the overall work being done, along with implementing the National Strategic Plan of the Gender-Based Violence and Femicide(GBVF).

The Chairperson said the Committee would invite the Department to give updates on the issues of GBV because the Department was expected to report on it.

The DG confirmed that the secretariat can be called through the Department. A lot was done, such as publishing the first annual report. Many DGs were complying because the issue of the NSP was on all their agendas in the DG cluster.

The CFO responded to the questions on underspending - as a result of laptops procured but not yet delivered, the challenge was non-availability of stock around the country. There were deliveries made in this financial year, and it was expected that the remaining laptops will be delivered in two weeks.  

The Department was pressurising the service providers and an alternative was proposed but was not in accordance with specifications that the Department issued. If it had proceeded it would attract an audit finding because it would mean that the Department changed specifications after it issued an RSQ to the market.

The Chairperson asked what kind of laptops were being sourced.

The CFO responded that it was normal laptops that must be used by all officials in the Department. The Department was procuring a standard laptop. After they were received, they will be configured by IT. The CFO said that Mr Shiviti can give details of the specs simply because he had more IT knowledge and understanding than she did.

The Chairperson asked what brand of laptop the Department was trying to source.

The DG confirmed that most officials use DELL and if it was not DELL, they use HP. The reason for different brands was because of how COVID-19 affected the service provider, in relation to the production of laptops and being able to deliver them in a set timeframe. The Department had, however, seen improvement. It is expected that the last phase of laptops will be delivered in two weeks.

Regarding the IT issues, the Chairperson said virements were done. She asked the CFO to break everything down that was done in relation to IT. When the Department started dealing with issues of procurement, was it not aware of all the things that could happen? Who was responsible for that? Did that person not know what would be needed?

The DG reminded the Committee that the Department had a Director who, it appeared, did not know anything about IT. The IT infrastructure of the Department crashed, and the Department did not have a website or anything, yet the Department had an IT Director who did not know anything. He was moved from the Department of Correctional Services to DWYPD. Although he was working in IT, even in Correctional Services, he did know what was happening. Unfortunately just before the DG challenged him, he passed away.

The Director did not submit anything – not even the costing of what was required. This was why the Department struggled until it appointed someone who then rearranged everything so they could be transferred to IT. Funds could not be allocated when the person responsible did not ask for funds. When SITA got involved, there was nothing in terms of IT; it had to build the website from scratch. There was no money, so the Department had to rearrange funds for IT. For the DWYPD, IT was critical – especially because the Department was responsible for M&E. It needed to have systems in place to do the monitoring but also to communicate with the public. That was why there were virements to ensure that IT had a budget.

The Chairperson asked Mr Shiviti to explain how the Director of IT was appointed because a person of IT needs to be tested on their IT knowledge and skills to vet their competence.

The DG responded that, at the time, Directors were being appointed by Ministers. So, maybe he was appointed by Minister Shabangu or Ministers before that.

Mr Shiviti added that the Director ended up in DWYPD because there was a cross transfer, where the Director moved from Correctional Services to DWYPD. The transfer was approved by (the then) DG Shreiner. As HR, Mr Shiviti said he was not involved because it was a cross transfer authorised by authorities higher up. Therefore he did not play any role in his recruitment whatsoever. His role was to execute the decision of the executive authority.

The Chairperson said the virements looked clumsy like they were done by someone who did not know their job. She was not satisfied with the explanation given regarding laptops. After a simple search on Takealot, there were 17 000 laptops available for delivery in two days. She could not understand where the service provider was sourcing the laptops from and why it was taking so long to get them.

The DG replied that the challenge of the procurement system within government was that the Department can only procure from people on the CSD or transversals. She gave an example of how she had seen a laptop bag for R4 000. When she tried to procure it through the procurement system, the same bag cost R16 000. There was also an incident where the Department had to cancel an order form because the supplier took six months to deliver. The problem was that once an order form was released, the Department had to give the service providers an opportunity because government believed that people need finances. Sometimes, it was not the Department that created the problems, but it was rather the system that did not work in the Department’s favour.

The CFO added that another challenge was that the Department was not privy to cancelled order forms. All it stipulated was the delivery date of items purchased. The procurement system allowed up to a year for delivery of items, and forbid cancellations within two months of the order forms being issued. Recently, because of COVID-19, there were many challenges with the delivery of a photocopying machine. The Department had to cancel the order form and start the process over. Another challenge was that the Department cannot approach the second bidder should it not get the assistance needed from the initial bidder because once it went to the second bidder, it became irregular expenditure.

The CFO responded to the questions about stationery saying that COVID-19 regulations stipulated that official offices must be occupied at 50% of capacity. If officials needed printing done, it was said they should make arrangements and report to the office because the Department was also managing the risk of procuring printers for all officials provided with laptops to work remotely. When the situation normalised, they would be able to access equipment otherwise not utilised.

Responding to the question about delays relating to the transfer, the CFO said that as a result of provinces not being approved by Treasury, there was an additional amount of R430 million that the NYDA received for implementation of the National Youth Service and Presidential Employment Programme for young people. The process was that once the budget was approved and tabled, the Department was required to submit projections to Treasury to indicate by when the Department was going to spend the money. For example, the NYDA will submit its breakdown to the Department that provided everything in terms of allocation received, and Treasury will use that information to approve the drawing that will inform the amount of cash Treasury must make available to the master account, which was the account of the Department. So if the process was still pending from Treasury, the Department could not have done the transfer without initial drawings at the beginning of the year, which did not include the R430 million received by the NYDA. The first tranche of R430 million was successfully processed and the Department was in the process of releasing the remaining balance approved by Treasury.

Responding to the question about why the Department was supporting funerals, the CFO said the Department supported the late Deputy Minister’s funeral in accordance with the guide on state funerals compiled by the office of the President. The guidelines indicated that in the instances where the Department did not have the available resources to afford the cost of the funeral, it had to go through the process of adjustment budgets. Costs were limited to the cost of the funeral, the coffin and catering for family members only.

A deviation report will be prepared and sent through the DG’s office to the Committee.

The Chairperson asked Members whether they based their questions on the quarter-two and quarter-three reports. Unfortunately, the Department covered quarter two only while the ARC covered quarter two and quarter three. She asked if there was anything in quarter three that the Committee felt strongly about.

Ms Ntlangwini asked what the amount for procuring laptops was, and how many laptops were outstanding. Did the delay of procuring the laptops not affect the work of officials because if they did not have laptops, one would assume that they cannot do their work?

With the COVID-19 regulations easing up and everyone steadily getting back to work and normality, what were the Department’s plans to get everyone back to the office, rather than having to wait for laptops that were not going to come? It is clear the service provider did not have the capacity to procure these laptops. How did this affect the staff payroll because they cannot work without their tools of trade?

The Chairperson asked why officials cannot borrow the laptops of those officials that resigned in the meantime.

The DG confirmed that all staff were back at the office as of 01 February 2022. What necessitated that was the relocation. The Department was preparing to move. Hopefully, the DPWI will be done by 31 March so that the Department can be in the new building by then. Staff have to pack while working towards a 100% achievement of the Department’s performance commitment.

DPSA sent a circular recently stipulating that staff must return to work but DWYPD was already back at work by then. Those not returning will be charged.

The Chairperson said the Department had the Committee’s full support. Officials must return to work. Who kept the tools of trade from staff that had resigned from the Department?

Mr Shiviti said 22 laptops were bought which were part of the ICT planning to replace laptops that had run their life span. Those who did not have laptops were using desktops. So everyone had a tool of trade for now, including cleaners, because even they had access to desktops.

There was an ICT asset register that was being audited by internal audit.

The Chairperson hoped this year things will be done right so that the Committee will not fight with the Department. Where the Department did not understand, it was welcome to contact the Chairperson through the DG. If there was any report that the DG wanted to present, she did not have to wait for the Committee to give a slot. The Committee Secretary will provide availability.

The DG responded to the question about the Southern African Development Community (SADC) protocol. She told the Committee that there was a meeting with the DGs of all four departments to look at the issues and escalate them to the Ministers. The Department of Home Affairs (DHA) developed a policy. Once approved by Cabinet, it will be translated into overall legislation governing all marriages in South Africa. At the moment there was different legislation:

  • The Recognition of Customary Marriages Act, which prohibited marriages under the age of 18
  • Civil Union Act, prohibited marriages under 18;
  • The Marriage Act allowed marriage from the age of 16. If both parties were younger than 16, both parties needed permission from the Minister of DHA or permission of the parents for a girl younger than 16.

In the SADC protocol, all laws dealing with marriages must prohibit marriages under 18. The Department of International Relations and Cooperation (DIRCO) did not want to approve and ratify that protocol because the Marriage Act stated ‘15 years’. DIRCO had since agreed as DHA had a policy that went through the DG cluster and Cabinet for approval. Taking this into consideration, DIRCO agreed that the protocol be ratified, although it was challenged on grounds of constitutionally. Heads of State will meet in March 2022, and all countries in SADC will ratify the protocol – including Mauritius, although the country was known for not ratifying anything. The only country left behind was SA, which was bad because it was known to have the best Constitution in the world, and it was the one Constitution that promoted children’s rights and there were even court decisions that criminalised ukuthwala. South Africa refused to ratify the amendment simply because the amendment said that countries must prohibit marriages of children under 15. The Department will send the correct communication and will come back to the Committee on the matter.

The Select Committee had already approved the protocol, and now the Department was waiting for the Portfolio Committee. Although it was ratified, it will not be in the publication. The Department did not meet the initial deadline and even when it was extended to December, it was still unable to meet the deadline.

Responding to the question about CSW, the DG said the theme this year was focusing on climate change, and SA was the chair of the CSW for 2022 and 2023 because it was a member state of the Bureau. SA was nominated and supported to be chair. The priority theme for 2022 was achieving gender equality and the empowerment of all women and girls in the context of climate change, environmental and disaster risk reduction, policies and programmes. The review theme was women’s economic empowerment in the world of work, which was the priority theme for the 60-second session. SA was one of the 11 countries that CSW was going to review. There will be two ministerial roundtables. However due to COVID-19, it will be 1+6 like, as with the United Nations General Assembly, but it will come with many restrictions. The opening will allow 1+3 and for other meetings, it will be 1+1. Only the six will be accredited. The UN was responsible for the accreditation and will only allow the six people from each country and were very strict. The Department was waiting for presidential guidance on who will attend.  

The Chairperson thanked the DG. She said the Committee will be doing an oversight visit around 28 March 2022. She thanked the DG and all officials for being part of the meeting as well Committee Members.

The meeting was adjourned.

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