NYDA Board: short-listing preparations

Meeting report

NYDA Board applications: briefing
Ms Kashifa Abrahams, Committee Content Advisor, said that she was part of the team that was able to provide summaries of the CVs. It was a long process and the team worked with the information that was provided. The summaries were prepared according to the information provided by the applicants on their CVs and included age, race, gender, and noted applicants with disabilities. The second part of the presentation outlined the process for accessing the summaries on the Parliamentary internal platform, uVimba, to view them.

The Committee Secretaries of the two Committees were responsible for receiving the CVs with the help of the Committee Assistants. The Content Advisors and Researchers created the summaries which were uploaded on uVimba. Where there is no CV submitted, this was noted on the system.

The total number of CVs was 1116 as there was a duplicate. There were 255 candidates that did not submit either their ID or qualification. Over and above the 255, there were 7 candidates that did not submit their CVs. In total, 262 applicants were not eligible as per the advert. The advert was clear that candidates were expected to submit their CV, ID and qualifications. The Committee was left with 854 applicants to consider.

The advert was explicit about youth preference. The team designed a formula that took into account all applicants under the age of 36, which was 512 with 314 of unspecified age and 33 over the age of 36.


There were 379 females (44%) and 480 (55.88%) males. There were more male applicants than females.

As for provinces, most applicants were from Gauteng and the fewest were from Northern Cape. The number of applicants received per province were: Eastern Cape – 63; Free State – 27; Gauteng – 397; KZN – 95; Limpopo – 48; Mpumalanga – 62; NW – 35; Northern Cape – 11; and Western Cape – 91; where applicants did not indicate province or address, it was noted as National – 30.

The race profile was 809 black Africans; 15 coloureds; 3 Indians; 3 white and 29 unspecified. As for race and gender, there were black African female – 350; black African male– 459; coloured female -10; coloured male – 5; Indian female – 1; Indian male – 2; and there were 17 females unspecified and 12 male unspecified; one white females and two white males. The applicants with disabilities were noted based on the information in the CV or in the nomination letter that was submitted.

The team included additional information on board experience and other working experience.

Ms Abrahams explained how Members could access the summaries on the platform. Members received a digital link which took them to the summaries. The names of the candidates had been blocked out for confidentiality reasons. The web page has an overview of all the candidates’ summaries. Time would be required for Members to go through all this information. She suggested the Committee decide how many applicants each Member can suggest.

Ms C Ndaba (ANC), Co-Chairperson, asked if the team indicated on uVimba why the 262 applicants were not eligible.

Ms Abrahams replied that the summaries seen in PDF format are the same as the summaries on uVimba. Members will be emailed the PDF summaries as well. As the system can be busy and slow down, the team collated all the summaries into PDF. Members would receive zip files and those files will come in batches, for example, from 1 – 49.

Ms Ndaba indicated that she had received a text from a COSATU representative that the candidate COSATU nominated is not appearing on the Parliament website list of names. This will be followed up but some organisations making nominations did not inform the nominated individual to submit their CV, ID and qualifications. The Committee will look into genuine complaints to ensure that everyone that applied is not left behind due to discrepancies.

Ms Nomvula Giba, Unit Manager: Committee Section, said that the team will look at the specific queries coming through and confirm if the persons who claim to have applied have been included.

Ms N Ntlangwini (EFF) asked how they should navigate to get the CVs on the website.

Ms Ndaba replied that Members will receive a link and will be able to access all the information. The Committee will not start shortlisting without attending to all the queries that are coming. All names must be uploaded and published on the website, until then the Committee will not start the shortlisting.

Ms Giba explained that all the CVs are on uVimba, which is the Parliament record system. Secondly, the Parliament website is where the team recorded all CVs received. Where no CV was submitted, must those names be included? If we must insert those names, the team will do so.

Ms Ndaba replied that the team was specifically instructed to put all the names of every individual who has applied even if people did not submit CV, ID or qualifications. We need to ensure that the process is as transparent as possible. South Africans must see that those who did not submit supporting documents are also included for everyone to see. Everything submitted must be published as raw as it is. Everyone knows what the requirements were.

Ms M Gillion (ANC; Western Cape), Co-Chairperson, asked if the administration team was yet ready. If not, the Committee can adjourn to give them a chance to finish and come with a product that Members need to start the process.

The Committee agreed to adjourn for a short break and this was later extended for an hour.

Proceedings resumed

Ms Ndaba thanked the Members for their patience and said the team will send the updated report to all Members. The remaining CVs will be uploaded on the Parliament website. On uVimba, Members can now access those CVs. Some applicants submitted their CVs with photos but the photos will not be published.

The team has checked the advert about what it stated on supporting documents. Qualifications were part of the requirements but the ID was not. However, it stated that applicants must write their ID number on the CV. The ones disqualified were those that did not submit qualifications as specified on the advert. Those that did not submit their IDs will now be included on the list.

The total was now 1003. This list will now be emailed to Members. Of the 1003, IT will run a process to check those that were under or over 36 years.

Members received a demonstration on how to navigate and access the names and view all the information of each candidate, both summaries and supporting documents.

The Committee had decided not to adjourn until the information was accessible to all Members. However, the process was taking so long that Members began feeling frustrated and asked why the Committee was not using the same system as the previous process.

Mr M Bara (DA, Gauteng) suggested that the Committee rely on the presentation which stated the total CVs received and the number that did not meet the requirements. If there is a query during the process, Members must be in a position to be pointed to the individuals that might have been overlooked for whatever reason. He was worried about the time constraints.

Ms F Masiko (ANC) agreed that the Committee should move forward and put aside the 111 that did not include qualifications in their applications. Members must agree on the number of candidates to shortlist. They should then be given an opportunity to present their list of preferred candidates after perusing the CVs. If any discrepancies come up with the nominated candidates, then the CV can be explored further by Members.

Mr L Mphithi (DA) agreed with the suggestions. If there is an individual that Members were unclear about, then Members can go and find that individual. The only matter stopping the process from moving forward is the delivery of the email batches to Members.

Ms Ndaba said that the team was now busy with ensuring that all Members received all the batches for both summaries, CVs published on the website as well as the list of CVs that have been disqualified. The staff needs to ensure that Members are able to access the documents – this is the reason it is taking this long. It is important that this was done in the meeting to ensure that the process remained transparent. She proposed that the Committee shortlist 40 names for interviews.

Ms T Mgweba (ANC) agreed with that suggestion.

The Committee agreed to shortlist 40 candidates.

Ms Ndaba said that Members needed to agree how many names each Member will shortlist from the 1003. The final product of 40 will come from the names that each Member will suggest. The shortlisting will take place tomorrow. She proposed 15 names for each Member.

Mr Mpithi said that 15 names each will total 165 which makes the list long.

Ms Ndaba replied that the 40 will come from the 165. The names that received the highest nominations are the ones that will be considered according to the tallied number of nominations from Members.

Members must take into account demographics, race, gender and people with disabilities. In fact, it would be better it each Member nominated 20 names.

The Committee agreed that each Member nominate 20 names instead of 15.

Ms Masiko suggested that the Committee set aside time for discussion on the shortlist. People must not simply be considered because they received the highest number of nominations; the qualifications and the requirements must be at the centre of the process.

Mr Bara suggested Members can nominate fewer than 20.

Mr Mpithi asked if a name is nominated more than twice, does that create a space for another name to be added.

Ms Ndaba replied that Members cannot add more names when this is an elimination exercise to shortlist 40 names. She suggested the Committee recommend 12 names for the consideration of the President to appoint.

Dr Herman Tembe, Legal Advisor: Office on Institutions Supporting Democracy, said that the Committee must recommend more than the available vacancies so the President may select from the recommended candidates. It is the prerogative of the Committee to decide how many names it wants to recommend to the President. The Committee cannot recommend seven, because that would mean that it was appointing the seven but that is the prerogative of the President.

Ms Ndaba suggested that this matter be parked for now and deliberated on later.

Each Member will shortlist 20 names but the Committee will shortlist 40 who will then be interviewed.

Ms Ndaba thanked Members for supporting the proposals.

Ms Giba said that Members were provided the link to access all the uVimba information. The emails with the PDF files are being sent in batches and the system is slow as these are being sent. Members can access the files on uVimba so long if they struggle to get the PDF files on email.

Ms Ntlangwini said that she has not yet received anything yet on email.

Ms Ndaba said she was also struggling accessing uVimba.

The Committee took a short break for all Members to receive the emails. However, when the Committee reconvened, the support team was still busy in completing this process so the Committee adjourned.