TUESDAY, 24 JUNE 2008
                                ____

          PROCEEDINGS OF THE NATIONAL COUNCIL OF PROVINCES
                                ____

The Council met at 14:09. The Deputy Chairperson took the Chair and requested members to observe a moment of silence for prayers or meditation.

ANNOUNCEMENTS, TABLINGS AND COMMITTEE REPORTS – see col 000.

                          YOUTH PARLIAMENT

                         (Draft Resolution)

Mr M A SULLIMAN: Chairperson, I move on behalf of the Chief Whip of the Council:

That the Council, noting that the Youth Parliament is taking place at Parliament on 26 and 27 June 2008 under the theme “Parliament empowering the youth for poverty eradication” –

1) recognises that this  will  be  the  last  Youth  Parliament  to  be
   conducted under the auspices of the Third Parliament;

2) acknowledges that this annual event has become  an  opportunity  for
   the youth to voice their  concerns  and  interact  with  Members  of
   Parliament about key issues that affect their lives;

3) notes that the declarations of the Youth  Parliaments  of  2006  and
   2007 will be reviewed, while deliberations will also take  place  on
   youth  and  their  economic  participation,  youth  development  and
   institutional arrangements in that regard and the role of  youth  in
   our social cohesion;

4) wishes all the participants in the Youth Parliament  well  in  their
   proposed activities; and

5) looks forward to receiving soon the Youth  Parliament's  report  and
   recommendations on the crucial issues that will have been discussed.

Motion agreed to in accordance with section 65 of the Constitution.

                   ANC LEADERSHIP IN KWAZULU-NATAL

                         (Draft Resolution) Mnu D D GAMEDE: Sihlalo ngizophakamisa:

Ukuthi uMkhandlu - 1) Ubongela isifundazwe saKwaZulu-Natali ngobuholi obusha obukhethiwe bukaKhongolose obuholwa nguSihlalo uDokotela Zweli Mkhize nabanye abaholi abafana noWillies Mchunu, Senzo Mchunu, Sihle Zikalala noPeggy Nkonyeni namanye amalungu;

  2) Uthi halala KwaZulu-Natali, halala  ANC  ngokubamba  ingqungquthela
     ebenempumelelo  nokuthula.  Ngizophakamisa   kanjalo.   Ngiyabonga.
     [Ihlombe.] (Translation of isiZulu draft resolution follows.)

[Mr D D GAMEDE: Chairperson, I move without notice:

That the Council –

1) congratulates the province of KwaZulu-Natal and the new leadership
   of the ANC led by its chairperson Dr Zweli Mkhize and various other
   leaders such as Willies Mchunu, Senzo Mchunu, Sihle Zikalala, Peggy
   Nkonyeni and other members; and


2) says well done, KwaZulu-Natal! Well done, ANC for holding a
   successful and peaceful conference. Thank you. [Applause.]]

Motion agreed to in accordance with section 65 of the Constitution.

                      ELECTRONIC VOTING IN NCOP

                           (Announcement)

The DEPUTY CHAIRPERSON OF THE NCOP (Ms P M Hollander): Before we proceed, I would like to inform members that we will be using the electronic voting system today.

This will help us to ensure that records of the House are easily captured and stored. I have also requested staff to put their voting cards on their desks. During the voting, I will explain to you how to use the system.

We now come to the motion on the Order Paper as printed in the name of the Chairperson of the National Council of Provinces.

                     SUSPENSION OF RULE 247 (1)

                         (Draft Resolution)

Mr M A SULLIMAN: Chair, on behalf of the Chairperson of the NCOP, I move:

That Rule 247(1), which provides inter alia that a sitting of the Council will be dedicated for oral questions, be suspended for the purpose of consideration of the Repeal of Black Administration Act and Amendment of Certain Laws Amendment Bill [B 50 – 2008] (National Assembly – sec 75), on Tuesday, 24 June 2008. Question put: That the motion be agreed to.

IN FAVOUR: Free State, Gauteng, KwaZulu-Natal, Limpopo, Mpumalanga, Northern Cape, North West, Western Cape.

Motion accordingly agreed to in accordance with section 65 of the Constitution.

The DEPUTY CHAIRPERSON OF THE NCOP (Ms P M Hollander): Order! We will now proceed with the questions as printed on the Question Paper. Before I call the Ministers to respond, I would like to remind you of the Rules. The time for asking a supplementary question is two minutes. Time for replying to supplementary questions is four minutes, and only four supplementary questions are allowed per question. We start at Question 47.

                      QUESTIONS FOR ORAL REPLY

                         PEACE AND SECURITY
                              Cluster 1

MINISTERS:

       Measures to ensure access to courts by poor communities

1. Kgoshi M L Mokoena (ANC) asked the Minister for Justice and Constitutional Development:

   Whether there are any measures in place to ensure that people in poor communities have access to courts closer to where they stay; if not, what is the position in this regard; if so, (a) what measures and (b) how will they be implemented? CO1259E

The DEPUTY MINISTER FOR JUSTICE AND CONSTITUTIONAL DEVELOPMENT: Madam Deputy Chairperson, I thank the hon member for the question, and also apologise on behalf of the Minister for not being here. She is attending a meeting with the Presidency in Pretoria.

As indicated in my budget speech of 29 May 2008 in this House, my department, in its undertaking to improve access to justice, has continued to commit a substantial amount of our budget towards building additional courts and providing facilities to deliver services in order to ensure that we reach out to poor communities, especially in remote areas.

We continue to build, in numbers, court buildings where there were none before. Not only have we built 23 new courts and refurbished and upgraded 58 courts in the last few years, but we have also improved the architecture and design of these courts to meet the service level standards befitting our constitutional era. These courts are more accessible to the people, including people with disabilities, and have built-in facilities commensurate with the work of the court, such as archives to safeguard court information and libraries to provide adequate capacity for legal research.

In my budget speech I have indicated the need by my department to review the spatial distribution of our courts as part of removing the relic of the apartheid court system, which perpetuates the denial of access to justice to the majority. The process of correcting this situation has gained momentum and I am pleased to announce that, over the next few months, we will be focused on creating the necessary infrastructure and human resource capacity in 23 of the 90 branch courts, which in the current financial year will be designated as self-standing main courts. By designating branch courts as main courts the communities in the rural and former black townships will enjoy the same access to justice, especially civil justice, as their counterparts in the towns and suburbs.

The process of identifying sites for building the High Courts in Limpopo and Mpumalanga is at an advanced stage. In the interim the department is procuring interim accommodation for the two High Courts to commence operating in these provinces as soon as possible. In Limpopo, the old magistrate’s office has been refurbished to provide interim accommodation; in Mpumalanga, an existing office has been identified and the necessary conversions will take place once the lease agreement has been negotiated.

I would also like to draw this House’s attention to the Jurisdiction of Regional Courts Amendment Bill, which confers civil jurisdiction on the regional courts and will be finalised during this session of Parliament. The intended legislation will ease the hardship and prejudice of the vulnerable and poor members of society who are compelled by the current system to seek legal redress in civil matters in remote courts beyond the borders of their provinces.

In conclusion, I wish to indicate further that the question of access to justice for all South Africans is one that is close to my heart and also to the heart of our Minister, but we realise that it will take some time to achieve this goal. My department has continuously assessed areas where there is a need for additional court services. Therefore, due to time constraints, may I request that the details of any new courts to be established be forwarded in written submissions to this House? I thank you.

Kgoshi M L MOKOENA: Chair, let me thank the Deputy Minister for his response to this question. I would also like to thank the department and the Ministry for coming up with the legislation that has just been mentioned by the Deputy Minister. This is a very progressive move.

Arising from the Deputy Minister’s response, as of now, complainants are, in most cases, not informed timeously when their cases are going to be postponed. Someone will travel for more than 70 km to go and attend his or her case, only to be called in the afternoon at about 15:00 to hear that the case has been postponed. This person had to get public transport to get there and to go back to where they came from.

Seeing that this is a challenge, what measures will be put in place to try and address that for those members of the community who, up until now, before these new measures are put in place, had to face these hardships? What can be done to try and improve the situation? Thank you.

The DEPUTY MINISTER FOR JUSTICE AND CONSTITUTIONAL DEVELOPMENT: This is a very big problem, and one that I think undermines the criminal justice system quite badly. You can imagine if you are poor and a case gets postponed 50 times, and you have to ask your employer to let you leave work 50 times to go and sit in a court where nothing happens. This is a huge problem.

As I’ve indicated to you and as you are aware, there is a review of the criminal justice system, which has again been initiated, and we are working at it. Hopefully, in the near future we will be able to come and brief you on it, but in that review of the criminal justice system we are looking at a whole lot of steps to change this. One of them is to create a screening mechanism in court that only trial-ready dockets go to court. Therefore, witnesses only have to be asked to go to court when they have to deal with the trials; they will not have to go to the postponements. In the meantime, we’re engaging the prosecuting authority to try and see if they can’t already start implementing some of those steps before we make those necessary changes. It is something that we are very seriously looking at and attending to.

Mr Z C NTULI: Chairperson, I would like to thank the Deputy Minister for the comprehensive response. We would like to find out whether there are still courts with the old-order demarcation, like magistrates courts, where you find that because it serviced a particular class you then had to go to the other side so that you can get access to justice? Are there still such courts in the Republic? Thank you.

The DEPUTY MINISTER FOR JUSTICE AND CONSTITUTIONAL DEVELOPMENT: I am not sure if I fully understand, but a lot of the demarcations we still have in our court system are still of the old order. That is the problem and we have clearly looked at trying to change some of those demarcations through the legislation, which has now been held back to be dealt with in the Superior Courts Bill at a higher level.

At a lower level, we are looking at a whole audit on the demarcation to see whether we should bring the demarcation of our courts in line with the present political demarcations. So, for example, at a lower level we now have about 300 new municipal areas, which are based on the municipal legislation. Do we bring the courts in line with that? At the moment their demarcation is still in terms of the 1994 Magistrates Act, which sets out the magisterial districts. That whole audit is taking place to ensure it brings this in line.

The bigger problem that will then take place is we then have to bring all the departments into line, so that they also fit in with those demarcations in the Justice cluster. This is again one of the issues in the review that is receiving attention, so as to make the necessary changes in the future. We are aware of the problem and we’re definitely, again, looking at changing them in accordance with the present political demarcations that exist at a national, provincial and municipal level.

Mr B J TOLO: Chairperson, I also want to thank the Minister and the department for having finally taken the decision that Mpumalanga will also have a High Court and thus join other provinces.

We all know that, over and above the advantages of litigating nearer to your home, there are many other advantages to having a Supreme Court in a province.

I know that in 1995-96 the provincial legislature of Mpumalanga established a commission of inquiry to find out as to where the Supreme Court should actually be located in Mpumalanga. Did they, in coming to the decision they had come to, take into consideration the recommendations of that commission that was established in Mpumalanga then? Thank you.

The DEPUTY MINISTER FOR JUSTICE AND CONSTITUTIONAL DEVELOPMENT: We haven’t come to any decisions, because, as I said, the Superior Courts legislation, which must change all that, is being held back to have further consultation with them. But what the legislation and the party you and I belong to, you will remember in 1987 at the Mafikeng Conference, decided was that the capital of each province should be the capital of the court of that province as well.

Obviously, once we are dealing with that legislation, the Superior Courts legislation, then clearly these issues will arise and we will have to look at them in that light. What I have reported here is that in the interim we will try and make it easier for people in those provinces, while we are waiting for that legislation to be dealt with. In the interim, we are creating interim structures and leasing interim property to let the cases from that province be dealt with in that province until we finalise this legal issue with regard to the Superior Courts Bill. So we are just dealing here, as I reported, in the interim.

Dr F J VAN HEERDEN: Madam Chairperson, I think that the hon Deputy Minister already addressed my question that I had in mind. It is in connection with the Superior Courts Bill.

In terme van hierdie wet word die trek van grense beskou en gaan Brits, byvoorbeeld, ingesluit word by die Hooggeregshof Mafikeng. As dit so sou wees, dan is dit ’n afstand van 245 km na daardie Hooggeregshof toe, terwyl dit na Pretoria se Hooggeregshof toe iets soos 30 km is. Maar ek glo die agb Adjunkminister weet reeds die deur is oop vir die … (Translation of Afrikaans paragraph follows.)

[In terms of this Act, the demarcation of borders are being considered and Brits, for example, is going to be included with the Mafikeng Supreme Court. If this is so, then it is a distance of 245 km to that Supreme Court seat, while it is about 30 km to Pretoria’s Supreme Court. But I believe the hon Deputy Minister already knows that the door is open on the …]

… Superior Courts Bill to have further input with regard to this Bill. Thank you.

The DEPUTY MINISTER FOR JUSTICE AND CONSTITUTIONAL DEVELOPMENT: You know, I think we must be careful, because there will always be one point that is further away than other points. If there is a border between places, the closest point to that border will obviously be closer to that area and the furthest point will be further away from it. So, if we are going to deal with it on that basis, we are going to have difficulties.

The way that we’ve looked at the matter is in the way of provinces as they are divided. In the justice of the moment we are sticking with the political decision that was taken on provinces. Clearly, when that Bill comes along, we can look at other options as well, but at this stage it’s the provincial boundaries that will prevail.

                Measures to empower victims of crime

1. Kgoshi M L Mokoena (ANC) asked the Minister for Justice and Constitutional Development:

   (a) What measures have been put in place to empower victims of crime,

   (b) how are such victims informed of their rights and (c) how are they benefiting from public awareness campaigns in this regard? CO1261E

The DEPUTY MINISTER FOR JUSTICE AND CONSTITUTIONAL DEVELOPMENT: The Department of Justice and Constitutional Development has established an interdepartmental committee on the Victims’ Charter. The interdepartmental committee consists of all departments in the cluster, as well as the Department of Education, the SA Human Rights Commission and the Commission on Gender Equality. The aim of the interdepartmental committee is to facilitate and co-ordinate the implementation of the Victims’ Charter. I will provide a short summary of some of the programmes established in the cluster to empower victims.

The National Prosecuting Authority has employed victim assistance officers or court preparation officers that provide assistance to victims when they go to court – 23 officers are employed nationally. The South African Police Service has established victim-friendly rooms in all police stations where victims of domestic and sexual violence can make statements and receive information. Currently, 216 police stations have victim-friendly rooms.

The Department of Social Development has established shelters for victims of domestic and sexual violence in four provinces. The shelters provide temporary accommodation for victims and also include skills programmes. The shelters have been established this year in Vryburg in the Free State, in Mitchells Plain in the Western Cape and in Sunnyside in Gauteng. In addition, the Department of Social Development has provided funding to 19 NGO victim empowerment programmes during this financial year from monies from the Criminal Asset Recovery Funds, Cara.

The Department of Correctional Services has ensured that victims can participate in parole board hearings, where they can give testimony that will assist the board in making its decisions about the granting of parole to offenders. Correctional Services has upgraded some of its facilities where parole board hearings take place to ensure that these are victim- friendly. The following facilities were completed at Kirkwood at Middledrift, at Grootvlei in Bloemfontein, Kroonstad, Polokwane, Nkomo, Glencoe, and another 15 sites are being completed in this financial year. Correctional Services is also in the process of establishing a national call centre, which will also deal with enquiries from victims.

The Victims’ Charter is being printed and is currently available in English, Afrikaans, IsiZulu, IsiXhosa, Sesotho, Tshivenda and in Braille. Brochures have been distributed to all departments so that they can reproduce and distribute it at different service points such as courts, police stations, public hospitals and correctional facilities. Brochures are currently also being distributed at multipurpose centres through GCIS.

My department has also developed and printed an A to Z directory of victim services of all the departments and distributed it to all courts countrywide. This service directory assists in referrals of victims to relevant support services. The Department of Justice also facilitates the integration of a victim service charter training programme into all our Justice College training programmes so that both our staff and the magistrates can get the benefit of the training and deal with victims accordingly. My department has also developed a communication strategy for informing victims about their rights. The strategy in 2007 has included a television advert on SABC TV and all radio stations, as well as an advertorial insert that was placed in all independent newspapers. In partnership with GCIS, a more comprehensive strategy is planned for 2008-09 to inform victims of their rights. This strategy is to be presented to the directors-general of the cluster.

The Department of Justice has planned provincial awareness campaigns about the Victims’ Charter for 2008. These campaigns have targeted rural communities. To date, five provincial awareness campaigns have taken place in the Eastern Cape, KwaZulu-Natal, the Free State, Northern Cape and Mpumalanga.

Lastly, I just want to point out, although I have said this already, that adverts in all eleven indigenous languages are going to be run in the foreseeable future to step up our awareness campaign. Thank you.

Kgoshi M L MOKOENA: Chairperson, let me again thank the hands-on Deputy Minister for his calculated response. It was very informative and will empower ourselves as well as the people out there.

Arising from the same response, the question I would like to ask is to find out from my dynamic Deputy Minister whether it isn’t time now for us to think of some kind of, for lack of a better term, reparation or compensation for these victims? Because when you think of restorative justice and talk of victims of crime, and you go to what we locally call traditional courts, there is this restorative justice, where a victim will be somehow, directly or indirectly, compensated or given some reparations.

There is no time for us to think of that, sir. I know this might take some time, but while having all these measures or programmes in place, can’t we think of something like that? Because there is this complaint out there that victims are always the losers. Even when they win a case, whatever there is will go to the coffers of the state. If we could just think of that. Thank you.

The DEPUTY MINISTER FOR JUSTICE AND CONSTITUTIONAL DEVELOPMENT: Obviously this is an issue that is raised often, and that is the issue of a victims’ fund. It is something we are still looking at, but we do believe that the best way to treat victims is to treat them correctly and make sure that we serve their interests through the criminal justice system.

Even if you go to some of the richest democracies in the world, for example the state of Minnesota in the United States and one or two other states in America, you do get these kinds of funds, but they are very, very limited and basically what they pay for is your doctors’ fees if you happened to be injured in the process. They are not what people are advocating, and that is to say that government must create a fund. You can imagine such a fund would be enormously draining on the resources if we had to create a fund where every victim, instead of suing people that had injured them, then came to the state for money.

It is something that we have looked at. There is a report by the SA Law Commission, but government has not taken this step as a policy to move in that direction. Obviously, as we move into our democracy, it is something we keep on having to look at and see whether we would want to deal with that.

I want to point out that even in the richest democracies it is incorrect what people are saying in the public, namely that these funds pay you quite a substantial amount. They usually only pay your hospital fees and so on. So it is a very limited way and purpose that they deal with, but we will keep an open mind as we go forward.

            Lack of public confidence in Legal Aid Board

1. Mr A T Manyosi (ANC) asked the Minister for Justice and Constitutional Development:

   (a) Why is there a lack of confidence in the Legal Aid Board among members of the public and (b) what is her department doing to restore the integrity of the LAB? CO1263E

The DEPUTY MINISTER FOR JUSTICE AND CONSTITUTIONAL DEVELOPMENT: Hon member, I am not aware that there is a lack of confidence amongst members of the public in the Legal Aid Board.

In fact, I believe that the services of the Legal Aid Board are sought after by many members of the public. In fact, we are looking at the statistics and it seems to us that almost 92% of criminal matters, particularly in the higher courts and in the regional courts, are dealt with by Legal Aid and not by private lawyers.

This is not to deny that some judicial employees of the board may face certain challenges, including a lack of experience, but the overall service of the board is acceptable and cannot be judged on the anecdotal comments of one or two individuals.

I would like to remind this House that the Legal Aid Board, established under the Legal Aid Act, is the vehicle through which the state provides for indigent persons charged with, or involved in, criminal offences where the person faces a substantial injustice being done if not represented, and in certain limited, specifically defined, civil matters.

Members of the public are represented in courts by some 1 600 in-house attorneys, as well as contracted attorneys and advocates from private firms, depending on the internal human capacity.

My department and the Legal Aid Board have various interventions in place to ensure that their services continue to reach, and meet, the needs of South Africans. Amongst these are regular executive meetings we have between the department, the Legal Aid Board and the Military Police Agency, MPA, where matters of strategic legal importance are discussed. Some of these matters are further dealt with by managers at the various technical levels.

Furthermore, I can also give you this to save some time, this written answer of mine. We have taken a whole lot of steps in the Legal Aid Board to make sure that the quality of their work is being overseen by their supervisors. I am just mentioning the principal; I am not going to read through all those.

I would also like to draw this House’s attention to the dedicated children’s court practitioners appointed at the Legal Aid Board centres. We now have 20 of the 58 centres where specific attorneys are being trained to handle civil matters concerning children. Legal practitioners in the remaining 38 justice centres have now also been trained to deal with these matters.

The Legal Aid Board will also further assist children in foster care and adoption cases where the children’s views are different from the views of the adults and we provide special representation in this regard. This representation of indigent children in these types of cases has increased by 20% monthly. The interventions and monitoring tools identified and managed by the Legal Aid Board are there to assist the Legal Aid Board in proactively responding to any concerns raised by the clients. The Legal Aid Board’s service delivery continues to show a significant improvement; hence, there is no need for me to take any specific action in addition to that which is in place, except to incrementally ensure that the Legal Aid Board increases its capacity.

For the period ending March 2008, the Legal Aid Board has reported an increase of about 10% of new and finalised legal aid matters, as compared to the previous year. Close to 400 000 legal matters were finalised in this financial year, with about 93% attended to by lawyers in-house.

I therefore request the hon member to provide me with details of specific cases where there have been complaints about the services provided by the Legal Aid Board. I will ensure that the complaint is addressed by my department in conjunction with the board. Thank you.

Mr Z C NTULI: Thank you, Deputy Minister, for the response. I would like to find out from the Deputy Minister whether the indigent people will be – I have heard you talk about the children – attended to as with the children’s civil claims. I am asking about the indigent people, whether the Legal Aid will be able to extend their expertise to the indigent people when they are doing the civil claims? Thank you.

The DEPUTY MINISTER FOR JUSTICE AND CONSTITUTIONAL DEVELOPMENT: As I indicated, according to the Legal Aid guide that has been adopted by Parliament, there is a certain limited amount of civil work that gets done by the Legal Aid Board. There are also, in some instances, like with children, constitutional requirements that we should attend to these matters. Clearly, with children we automatically provide it. For all legal aid matters there is an indigent test - what we call a means test – and you have to comply with the means test.

At the moment the new guide, as you have requested in this House as well, is being looked at and changed, and that indigent test would be changed upward to include more people in it, but clearly it would not include everyone. There is a big group of people, particularly in the middle classes and the upper classes, that would clearly deal with their own matters. So, as you know, the guide does not provide that all indigent people in all civil matters get dealt with; the rules are very specific. The idea is, of course, as we obtain more money and as we become a stronger democracy, to extend the civil services that we are already providing in criminal matters further and further. The limitation is placed there by the budget constraints of the department.

Mnr N J MACK: Agb Adjunkminister, die enigste tyd wanneer ons hoor van ’n regshulpprokureur is wanneer ons in die moeilikheid is en wanneer ons nie geld het nie. Hoekom word hulle nie bekend gestel in die areas waar hulle werksaam is nie? Hoekom hoor ons nooit van die suksesse wat hulle behaal nie? Ons beheer nou wel nie die media nie, maar hoekom word hierdie suksesse nie aan ons meegedeel so dat ons hierdie mense kan waardeer vir wat hulle doen nie? Is daar te min geld vir dekking in die media? Dankie.

Die ADJUNKMINISTER VIR JUSTISIE EN STAATKUNDIGE ONTWIKKELING: Nee, ek dink ons moet versigtig wees. Die hele regshulpstelsel het van ’n ’’judicare’’- stelsel verander na ’n kliniekstelsel toe. Omtrent 90% van alle werk word nou in die Regshulpraad se klinieke self gedoen. Die hoeveelheid werk wat nie deur die raad gedoen word nie maar deur private prokureurs en advokate, is omtrent 10% en dit word net gedoen waar daar ’n konflik is tussen die kliënte wat reeds deur die Raad bedien word.

Ek sal ’n bietjie ondersoek gaan instel na hoekom daar nie genoeg gesê word oor hulle suksesse nie, maar ek dink – ek is seker – as jy daar na die Minister van Veiligheid en Sekuriteit langs jou kyk, hy hoop dat daar wat kriminele sake betref nie te veel suksesse deur die Regshulpraad behaal word nie. Anders het ons ook die probleem dat daar niks mense gevangenis toe gaan nie, en die Minister hier sal ook nie gelukkig wees as daar nie meer mense na die gevangenis toe kom nie. So, ons moet ook hoop dat die Regshulpraad nie te suksesvol raak nie, want anders kom al die kriminele skotvry daarvan af. (Translation of Afrikaans paragraphs follows.)

[Mr N J MACK: Hon Deputy Minister, the only time we hear about a legal aid lawyer is when we’re in trouble and when we don’t have money. Why aren’t they introduced in their operational environment? Why do we never hear about the successes they achieve? We may not be in control of the media, but why aren’t these successes conveyed to us so that we can appreciate these people for what they are doing? Is there not enough money for media coverage? Thank you.

The DEPUTY MINISTER FOR JUSTICE AND CONSTITUTIONAL DEVELOPMENT: No, I think we should be careful. The entire system of legal assistance has changed from a judicare system to one of legal clinics. About 90% of all work is now being done at the actual clinics of the Legal Aid Board. The amount of work that is taken care of not by the board but by private attorneys and advocates is about 10% and then it is only done if there’s a conflict between the clients who are already being served by the board.

I will investigate why not enough mention is made about their successes, but I think – I am sure – looking at the Minister of Safety and Security next to you, that he would hope for not too many successes by the Legal Aid Board as regards criminal cases. Otherwise we will also have the problem that nobody is going to jail, and the Minister over here will also be unhappy if people are no longer coming to jail. So, we must also hope that the Legal Aid Board does not become too successful, otherwise the criminals will all go scot-free.]

Kgoshi M L MOKOENA: Thank you to the Deputy Minister for the response. As oversight practitioners, when visiting departments and, in particular, correctional services centres, people who are reluctant to make use of the services of the Legal Aid Board are the awaiting-trial detainees. Chairperson, I will just give a few examples of their gripes. Firstly, they complain about double-booking by the Legal Aid Board – double-booking for the same date, same time and they cannot appear. Secondly, they complain that they are urged or coerced to plead guilty, because the purpose would be just to up their conviction rates. When they urge them to plead guilty, they are saying that they will plead for mitigation for them. That is their complaint. That is what people are complaining about.

During the budget hearing the departments promised to follow up this reluctance and these complaints. I wonder: How can we try expeditiously to curb some of these anomalies that people are complaining about? Some of these small issues are tainting the image of the Legal Aid Board, because some of us are aware that they are doing a very good job. Some of these things are really frustrating. In one area it was confirmed that they urged these awaiting-trial detainees to plead guilty. If the Deputy Minister can just unpack this one, I would appreciate it. Thank you.

The DEPUTY MINISTER FOR JUSTICE AND CONSTITUTIONAL DEVELOPMENT: I am really scared to look at anecdotal evidence, particularly with regard to prisoners who are sitting there and – I mean, Kroonstad, four days ago, started a strike where there are also people that are doing legal aid - they come up with all kinds of stories. They went to look there and, in fact, the reason why they only now have got Legal Aid lawyers is because previously the advocates and the lawyers that they had weren’t paid and they have now had to give up those cases. Who do they blame? They blame the Legal Aid lawyerwho was appointed just the other day.

I think we must be careful with regard to anecdotal evidence. I would want to say this: If you go anywhere and someone complains of the service of the Legal Aid Board, please send them to go and lodge a complaint. There are no complaints there at all. It is all anecdotal, so we can’t see whether they are true or not without anyone acting. For example, with regard to the issues you raised, if there is a Legal Aid lawyer that forces someone to plead guilty I, firstly, find it very strange, because part of their performance agreement is to get people off, not to plead guilty. I don’t know what benefit they could get by getting people to plead guilty.

Secondly, if you do that, clearly it is against the ethics of a lawyer. If you are forcing someone to do something they don’t want to do, to plead guilty, for example, that person must definitely go and lay a complaint with the Law Council. In this case you said KwaZulu-Natal, so it would be the KZN Law Council.

If it is a complaint on capacity and so on, of course, that complaint has to be lodged either with the board, with us or, of course, with the Public Protector - I mean, if it is a person you are complaining about, or if people aren’t providing proper services in the Public Protector, or if it’s a human rights issue. Once these people are making these complaints, please encourage them to go and make them to the right authorities, so that we can investigate and see if there is any truth in these matters. Otherwise, they are just going to remain anecdotal.

I must tell you, before I came to Parliament I practised law for at least 9 or 10 years, and I can’t remember that there were clients that were ever happy about being in court and with their lawyers, even the ones I got off. It is just one of those things. Please, if there are complaints, there may be problems within the legal aid system, then let’s get the complaints on paper, get them to the right authorities, let’s investigate them so that we can come and answer them properly. Otherwise, I am going to just keep on having to say that they are anecdotal, I don’t know how to respond to them. Thank you. Ms A N T MCHUNU: Hon Deputy Minister, may I please know if the traditional courts are used to disseminate information about the Legal Aid Board? Thank you.

The DEPUTY MINISTER FOR JUSTICE AND CONSTITUTIONAL DEVELOPMENT: I am not sure. I doubt it. As far as I know, there is no legal representation before the traditional courts, so I imagine Legal Aid doesn’t come into play. I am not aware that that is disseminated through there. That may all change through the new Bill that’s in Parliament now. Of course, we are trying to create a slightly different role and add training for traditional leaders that are doing judicial cases, but at this stage I don’t think that what you have asked is happening.

Effect of vacancies in key departmental positions on service delivery and access to justice

1. Mr A T Manyosi (ANC) asked the Minister for Justice and Constitutional Development:

   Whether the many vacancies in key positions in her department are affecting (a) service delivery and (b) access to justice; if so, (i) how, (ii) what are the reasons for all the vacancies and (iii) when will this challenge be addressed? CO1264E

The DEPUTY MINISTER FOR JUSTICE AND CONSTITUTIONAL DEVELOPMENT: Chairperson, thank goodness this is my last one. [Laughter.] This one was also dealt with during the budget debate. Vacancies in key positions in my department have not affected service delivery and access to justice. I can gladly inform the House that during this financial year, my department has reduced its overall vacancy rate from 23% to 12%. We said that in the House during the debate.

However, I asked my department to give me the vacancy rate. Having looked at it, it’s clear to me that these figures are not correct and that they are much lower. What they have done is they have included in this list 23 senior magistrates, 4 chief magistrates, 16 regional magistrates, 1 regional court president, 1 special grade chief magistrate and 28 judges. Those vacancies are not part of the department. Those refer to judges and magistrates. They get appointed through the Magistrates Commission and the Judicial Service Commission. So, although those posts are vital within the justice family and although they are vital and key, I do not think they make up part of the numbers of the department. So, I will relook this and I will definitely give you what I actually think the percentage is in a written form because it is definitely below 12%. The vacancies of magistrates and judges should be reflected separately.

We all know that judges get appointed twice a year. In April and in October, the Judicial Service Commission fills all existing vacancies. All such vacancies are filled every time. The magistrate sits throughout the year filling those vacancies and giving recommendations to the Minister to sign. So, it seems to me that the figures are much, much lower, and we have actually done much better during the year. I have asked them, in line with what I found in this document, to redo the figures. The reasons on how we turned this around have been written down here. I am not going to go through them. I think we discussed some of them during the budget debate, and it is time consuming. So, I will let you have this.

On the second part of the question, the reasons for vacancies are resignations, retirements and the transfer of employees. In certain instances, my department experienced difficulties in recruiting candidates that met the requirements of posts. This is a challenge that most government departments are currently faced with.

The robust recruitment drive undertaken by my department has seen our vacancy rate in senior positions reduced to 118 or 12% - I have already explained that a lot of the vacancies shouldn’t be there. To date, 41 of these posts have already been advertised and we are in the process of filling them. The remaining posts will be advertised shortly.

I would like to inform the House that my department has also introduced an internship programme that will give our graduates an opportunity to acquire the required skills in law. In this financial year, my department set aside R15 million to sustain this programme. We have placed over 130 legal graduates in various areas in line with the National Youth Service Programme. At least 80 of them are presently at university law clinics, while another 45 are in the Office of the State Attorney. So, our whole internship programme is growing substantially every year to get more people into the system.

Mr D A WORTH: Chairperson, I would like to ask the Deputy Minister whether he thinks that any of these vacancies, be it in the magistrates’ section or wherever, has any influence on the number of cases being struck off the roll. Thank you.

The DEPUTY MINISTER FOR JUSTICE AND CONSTITUTIONAL DEVELOPMENT: No, not at all. I mean, if we don’t have permanent posts in the case of magistrates, I make acting appointments. So, every single post is filled all the time. There is never a magistrate’s post or a judge’s post that stands empty. If those posts have been approved by Treasury, we fill them with acting appointments all the time until permanent appointments are made. Likewise, in the department, when senior posts are vacant, we obviously fill them with an acting one. If a DDG is not there, then we fill the post with an acting DDG till that post is filled, and so we fill the other posts as well.

But that’s just part of the problem with filling vacancies. There is movement all the time. Because of these acting appointments, you then have to appoint someone there in that post and then you have to put an acting appointment from lower to fill it up. That’s what happens. You will never get a full vacancy because government just doesn’t work like that. You have to then advertise the new post – you have to go through a process before you can fill it. But we fill all those posts with acting appointments. They don’t stand empty.

Mr B J MKHALIPHI: Chair, I just want to know from the hon Deputy Minister whether the department does employ interns in their department. If so, what does the corps of interns do to alleviate the vacancy rate in the department? Thanks.

The DEPUTY MINISTER FOR JUSTICE AND CONSTITUTIONAL DEVELOPMENT: Well, you remember the President, one or two years ago, said in a speech that we need to draw more interns into the different departments. Our department has done that from the beginning. The idea with interns is not so much to fill the vacancies. These are usually people with legal skills but who just came out of university and can’t get work. So, we draw them into the department at a stipend or allowance that is paid throughout government - a certain amount of money that they then get paid.

In this way, they then acquire experience and skills while they are looking for work. Many of them, specifically the good ones, then of course try and stay on in the department – whether it’s within Corrections or Justice. They try and stay where they are. So, that is the purpose of the whole internship programme. It’s a way to try and give people exposure which they wouldn’t have otherwise, and in that way try and let them have skills to then apply for jobs in that department or elsewhere.

Kgoshi M L MOKOENA: Chairperson, as “padkos” to the Deputy Minister, since this is the last question, one other reason for these vacancies in key positions, we were told, is resignations because of poaching by other entities. Does this not call for the department to review their retention strategy or policy? Thanks, Chair.

The DEPUTY MINISTER FOR JUSTICE AND CONSTITUTIONAL DEVELOPMENT: I wish I could answer that. I think if someone could answer that question for the Ministers or Deputy Ministers, it would solve all of our problems. If you have that answer, you must give it to us because you will solve a lot of problems. The situation is this: Good people are mobile. What happens is, particularly in government in the last 13 years, we attracted good young, black women candidates to the civil service – an opportunity which they didn’t have previously. So, they get exposed to really good work and very responsible work at a much earlier stage that they wouldn’t get anywhere else when they go and work. But what happens is that the good ones then develop very quickly. They are then so mobile. We can pay them a certain salary, on level 13, for example, but the private sector would then move in and give them 3 or 4 times that salary. I mean, just look at any good communication person in government, for example. I remember when the late Dullah Omar was still working here, I think there was a person who got a salary of R90 000. Sanlam and people from those companies came along because they saw this person in the arena talking and they took the person and offered the person three times that salary. We couldn’t go to Minister Fraser-Moleketi and say to her that she must please then let us pay the guy three times what he was getting then to keep him. So, that is why I say if you have an answer to this issue you will solve a lot of problems. It is a big issue.

But government has, in our wisdom, come up with a lot of strategies. The latest strategy we have is the occupation specific dispensation, OSD. What the OSD does is within the salary structures of government. If you are in a particular area, you need to create a particular career path for people - whether you need professionals or not. So, people don’t have to go through level 1, 2 and 3, like others. Let us say, for example, you get a detective that is very good as a detective in the Police Service and he reaches a certain level in the service. The only way he can get a promotion, since there are people above him, is then for him to move around in the rest of the police force. Then we lose the skills and the service of that detective. So, what we have done in government is that we are looking at OSDs as a skills retention mechanism in certain key areas. We have done this with teachers, nurses and legally trained staff.

There are other areas we are now also looking at, particularly in the Police Service - how we can create a special career path so that people can stay on till they are 50 or 60 years of age, and they don’t have to become managers. I mean the civil service is crazy. When you are a doctor in Health or you are in Justice, if you are really good in court or in operations and so on and you come to a ceiling, the only way then to get a promotion is by leaving practice and becoming an administrator. So, your best-skilled doctors, lawyers, etc, are lost. The civil service is structured in such a way that at some stage you will have to then become an administrator and stop practising. You stop doing operations and you stop doing law.

All these things are the kinds of things we are looking at in the civil service – how we can restructure that. One of them, as I said, is with this OSD that will then be able to let one get the same salary while they remain a detective, for example, or they don’t have to then become an administrator. That is one of the retention strategies. But if anyone has other suggestions for us, I think all the Ministers here will be very excited, and you will get a Nobel prize for actually giving us that information. Thank you.

 Progress in integrating metropolitan police into SA Police Service

1. Mr Z C Ntuli (ANC) asked the Minister of Safety and Security:

(a) What progress has been made in integrating the metropolitan police
into the SA Police Service, (b) what are the challenges in this regard,
(c) how will the remaining members be integrated and (d) how soon will
the matter be finalised?                 CO1266E

The MINISTER OF SAFETY AND SECURITY: Chairperson, may I respond here from the podium, please? Thank you very much, Chairperson. The reason for this is that my hearing is becoming worse and worse and therefore I have to be able to look at the person who is asking a question in order for me to understand the question - that is the only reason. [Laughter.]

Members would be aware that there are decisions that have been taken to update the South African Police Service Act to produce what is generally referred to as the Safety and Security Act. What we want to do regarding that matter, therefore, will be in the end to place before Parliament the relevant update which talks to a number of issues, including the metropolitan or municipal police services.

That being so, if I am asked at this time what we have done regarding the integration, the answer is we have not done much, because we want to utilise the opportunity of redrafting the Act in order for us to do the things we want to do.

However, I wanted to indicate to this House how I personally feel about the matter. I have had discussions with senior police management and they also have the same attitude towards it, which is that we do not seek to take away administratively the municipal or metropolitan police services from the municipalities themselves, as I say, with respect to the administration of those services. But we want to create a situation where they become a force multiplayer and with respect to that therefore to be in constant and dynamic contact with the police on the basis of operational matters.

Secondly, we want to ensure that they do not simply administer by-laws, with respect to policing, but that they also participate in crime prevention. We have already started a process whereby the various police chiefs in the municipalities and metros attend meetings, strategic sessions, with the police so that they discuss how, together, they can begin to address matters relating to crime. That is the position, therefore, as it stands.

Mr Z C NTULI: Thank you, Chairperson, and thank you, Minister, for the comprehensive response. I just want to check about the community safety forums that we are talking about – I remember we said it has to happen at a local level – in order to find out whether the municipal or metro police would be part of the metro police or whether they would form part of the SAPS, if we say they are integrated from the top downwards?

The MINISTER OF SAFETY AND SECURITY: Chairperson, I am sure the hon Ntuli is aware that that issue is part and parcel of the changes that we want to make. Therefore, in the end we will have the community safety forums and everywhere where there is activity, policing, correction, justice, and so on. There will be those structures, from national right down to the locals.

In other words, at the local level where you have the metropolitan or municipality police service, that structure will be directly operational, together with those that are serving in that metropolitan structure. It will not be via the SA Police Service, so to speak; it is people on the ground and therefore that service which will be on the ground that will have a relationship.

However, this is a broad structure. It means, therefore, where policing is done – be it at national, provincial or local level there will be a relationship via the community safety forums.

Mr J W LE ROUX: Chairperson, could the Minister explain to this House the main reasons for bringing the metro police into the SA Police system; and were there huge problems as it was in the past that made it really necessary to do this?

The MINISTER OF SAFETY AND SECURITY: Chairperson, I thought that members understood what I was saying. I was talking about my point of view and that I have bounced this off others and there seems to be support for this view, that we will not integrate them physically into the SA Police Service. They will continue being administered by the local municipality or metro where they exist.

For instance, here in Cape Town you have the Cape Town Metro Police structure and that will continue to be administered by the metro. What I am saying is that they become a multiplayer in the sense that they will then, together with the police, work on operational matters. We don’t believe that metro police ought to be dealing with by-laws only.

We believe that they can be part and parcel of crime prevention and to that extent, therefore, they get more powers but they will retain their autonomy, and nonetheless, continue to work with the police. What the law currently says is that it is the national Police Service that defines the national strategy for policing. And therefore they will take their marching orders from that national policing strategy. Otherwise it’s not integration into the police.

I don’t know what you as lawmakers will say when we present the relevant Bill to Parliament. You may decide that they need to be integrated fully or whatever, I don’t know. But when the Bill comes to Parliament, through the Minister of Safety and Security, it will talk to that issue. Thank you.

      Dedicated team to address low morale of police officials

1. Mr N J Mack (ANC) asked the Minister of Safety and Security:

   Whether there is a dedicated team addressing the low morale of some of the police officials in his department; if not, why not; if so, (a) how and (b) what are the further relevant details? CO1267E

The MINISTER OF SAFETY AND SECURITY: Chairperson, you know in the Police, while understanding the pressures that members of the police have, we have decided to establish a dedicated unit which deals with those pressures, traumas and so on, and we call it the employee assistance services. That service is populated by people who are religiously inclined, in other words, there are ministers there. Some of them are serving as chaplains and others are attending to the religious needs of our members. There are social workers who are also part of that establishment as well as psychologists.

What they do is to look at the wellbeing of members, right across the board, and what things worry them. They are able to pick up as quickly as possible when there are difficulties. These difficulties are varied - some have to do with problems at home, and some have to do with financial matters, and so on. When these are picked up, that entire unit is then brought to bear on trying to find answers to some of the problems that members experience.

To that extent, therefore, they will do a number of things, including the briefing of members on what is actually bothering them, how it can be addressed, and so on. The team also deals with matters of low morale in the service.

I must say, therefore, that after we put it in place, people who in the past were not willing to come forward and share their problems have begun to do so now, because there is a combination of people who are interacting with them. Some of them, as I say, are people who are religious who sit down with the members and get them to talk about the problems they have. So, we have that unit in place which is assisting in cases where our members are going through traumatic patches in their lives.

Mr N J MACK: Minister, I am very pleased with the answer. I would just further like to say, especially in these cases, that we need to determine beforehand the symptoms when someone shows low morale and depression. Usually, low morale also comes with the inability to deal with the work stress, or with communicating or the handling of our people in conflict conditions. As a result, our police have low morale and they are afraid to attend to certain issues because they do not have that ability. Are there any refresher courses where capabilities are developed for them to handle these very stressful situations?

The MINISTER OF SAFETY AND SECURITY: Hon member, yes, many of our people undergo various types of counselling, but there are others who also attend those sessions in order for them to understand what actually happens when someone is said to be depressed and what the causes of their problems are. I do want to say - we are upfront about this - that it is not always that we will pick up a problem right at the beginning. It is not always that we will be able to do that. But we also rely on members who work together with those who are affected, who have been instructed that, immediately when they see that there are difficulties, to report to the commanders. You work together with someone who is undergoing difficulties or your life may be in danger simply because that person will not be able, among other things, to cover you when there are difficulties. So, we encourage people to report as soon as they pick up signs that there are difficulties. So, we try to do that.

As I’ve already indicated, it must not be read to be saying that we cover each and every instance where problems arise. That is not so. We deal with those that do come to our attention. We encourage people to tell us when they see the relevant signs. We take them into sessions to indicate what those signs might be and teach people how to respond as an attempt to pay initial attention to the problems of fellow members in the service.

Mr B J MKHALIPHI: Chairperson, I would like to know from the hon Minister whether the department does recognise the contribution that is made by participation in extramural activities by police officers, and if so, does the department support these participating members in any way so that these activities contribute to the uplifting of their morale?

The MINISTER OF SAFETY AND SECURITY: Chairperson, there are many events that are organised for this and, by the way, I don’t see some of you attending those events. One of them, which happens annually, is what is called Polmusca, that is, the police’s musical festival. Every year we have that. It is one of the most brilliant programmes that we have. I must indicate that our musicians, the singers and those who play music, I believe, are the best in this country.

The Minister of Correctional Services knows this. Our bands are much better than his. Our singers are much better than his. In fact, I said to him sometime back that I would want us to upgrade the competitions – he also has those competitions – to a competition where the people in his service compete with those in my service. It would be a brilliant thing. But that’s not the only one. In a few weeks’ time, or days, we will be in East London where there will be an International Rugby Tournament of police structures across the world. Unfortunately, I don’t remember the date offhand.

With soccer it is the same. They go abroad and participate in all manner of activities. That helps people to destress to a very large extent. There are other things that they are involved in, including educational ones. There are a number of programmes that the police are involved in. Thank you very much.

Kgoshi M L MOKOENA: Chairperson, I would like to thank the hon Minister for the response, because it’s really taking us somewhere. Arising from this response, Chair, the question is: Why do these frustrated, demotivated, depressed, stressed and devastated officials, in your own research, hon Minister, when they are going through all these traumas, turn their anger to their own families? This is worrying because the next target onto which they relieve their stress is their families. There is one instance where a police officer just maimed his whole family, and this when the chaplain said this guy was stressed, frustrated or whatever. In your own research, Minister, why is such anger vented in this manner on their next of kin?

The MINISTER OF SAFETY AND SECURITY: Well, the SA Police Service is a microcosm of what is happening in society. Those people behave in the same way that society at large behaves. It is just that the uniform easily distinguishes them from the rest.

One of the biggest problems we have is what we define as social crime. Social crime accounts for most of the serious and violent crimes that are happening in South Africa because these are people who are found in the same circumstances because they are either relatives or family friends, and so on. They are always found in the same environment. It is in that environment that they begin to fight over issues relevant to their lives. For instance, if it is a husband and wife and the wife is asking about the money, because the husband is not bringing the money back home, then that issue becomes so problematic that someone is attacked.

We have commissioned a private company to tell us and help us to understand why there is so much violence and crime in South Africa. Their final report is going to be available at the end of this year. And hopefully from the beginning of next year it will become a report that will be tabled in Parliament to try to generate a discussion in South Africa on how to deal with that question.

So, these police officers who act in the way that the hon Kgoshi has explained are part and parcel of that milieu of problems revolving around social crime. That is a big problem we have. If, as a country, we were able to resolve that problem, I’m telling you, crimes like murder would be reduced by 80% because that is what it is. Social crime murders form 80% of the total rate of murder that we have.

Incidentally, on Monday we are publishing the crime trends report, which will also include the crime statistics. I can tell you now that the matter continues to be so bothersome because when we release that report, it will be clear that social crime is still a big problem in South Africa.

Mr F ADAMS: Hon Minister, the morale of staff at police stations is sometimes very low because of abuse by their station commissioners, their seniors and all that. Is this team addressing that because you do get the policemen who are dedicated to their work? Sometimes they love to be policemen and policewomen but when they get to the police station, they do not form part of the blue-eyed boy circle or blue-eyed girl circle of the station commander, station commissioner or any higher ranking officer above them. That also breaks down the morale.

The MINISTER OF SAFETY AND SECURITY: Thank you very much for the question. Yes, that team does that as well, but what is also available to members who are treated in that fashion is a complaint system that is in place. When they feel that they are being ill-treated in their workplace, they can activate that and report it. But more than this, as I indicated a while back, we have produced what is called a management tool, which is also able to understand what is happening in the various stations that we have and where low morale is affecting the performance. Those stations are targeted for serious interaction between the senior police management and the station.

Just to have an understanding of what is happening, we have quite a vibrant human resources development unit that tracks all of these things. Therefore, it is part and parcel of our work to try to address that particular problem. I am sure it will be clear to members that what we want to achieve in the end is success in the fight against crime, and we can’t do this with units of people who are dissatisfied. That is why, now and again, the issue of the conditions of the Police Service comes up for discussion. It has to do with that particular matter because we do not want people who are responsible for our safety and security and protection to be disgruntled.

Training of community police forums by national Secretariat for Safety and Security

1. Mr N J Mack (ANC) asked the Minister of Safety and Security:

   (a) How often does the national Secretariat train members of the community police forums (CPFs), (b) how is the community benefiting from this training and (c) how many members of the CPFs are benefiting from the training? CO1268E

The MINISTER OF SAFETY AND SECURITY: Chairperson, it would be so nice if we could deal with both Questions 53 and 54. They are talking about the same issue. I could give an explanation, but I suppose you want me to take them one by one? Where I come from we say, “by one by one”. I’ll deal with Question 53 first.

The law, as it stands, never created any system by which we could make available to the community police forums those resources that they required – it’s not in the Act at all.

The community police forums, therefore, to a very large extent, have had to rely on the tender mercies of the person who is the commissioner at a particular station. If the person who is a commissioner at a station is not open and hospitable to the community police forums, he or she will not help them.

One of the reasons that we are revamping the community police forums is for us to ensure that we resource them independently as a unit that is necessary, amongst other things, to co-ordinate a relationship between the people and the Police Service.

In terms of the law, the law that I referred to earlier, we are trying to ensure that that law will address this particular problem so that we can directly resource them to be able to do the work that needs to be done.

You don’t have in the Police Service a system that is designed to train the community police forums, although we said, when we were conceptualising this, that the police must take responsibility for the training of those forums. What the police are doing, therefore, is that they themselves have a dynamic interaction with the members of the forums and they help them accordingly.

With respect to your question regarding the national Secretariat for Safety and Security, what happens there is that they do not give any training at the level of the national Secretariat for Safety and Security. What happens is that each province has a provincial secretariat and those provincial secretariats are responsible for the training of the members.

To go back just a little to why the community police forums were established: Their main function is to co-ordinate this relationship between communities and the police. We want to establish in South Africa what is called “community policing”, so that communities, working together with the police, in an environment of friendship, will give the police the information that they require. That is what the community police forums are doing.

Therefore, in the main the training is focused on bringing up such members in order for them to understand what it is that is required in order for them to be able to create this system of co-ordination with the communities.

Because community police forums interact with communities, the first thing that happens is that communities are therefore galvanised to participate directly in the fight against crime by providing information to the police, by making themselves available for the reservist system and by making themselves available to do volunteering work. So they benefit communities in that particular way.

We do not have a number at this stage, but we will get it for you, to indicate how many members of the community police forums have received training. At a later stage, we will collate that information and make it available to you. Thank you very much.

Mr N J MACK: Chairperson, I just have two concerns that I would like to raise with the Minister. When community police forums are at work, they usually use the same telephone extensions as the police. Sometimes you find that community police forums want to monitor the police very strictly and that their focus is more on that than being the link between communities and the police.

Is this role specifically spelled out during training? Sometimes you find community police forums are doing worse than the police when going into a home to arrest a suspect, and that creates friction within the same community.

My main question is: How, during training, are the forums’ capabilities harnessed so that they can assist the broader public to be more aware of its rights and to be law-abiding? Is that specified as part of their training? Thank you.

The MINISTER OF SAFETY AND SECURITY: Thank you very much, hon Mack. Unfortunately, when we established the community police forums we did not go back to how we had conceptualised them. What we said would happen – which is what we are now trying to do – is that the forums would be co- ordinating structures. As such, what they would then do is that they would sit together with the police and say that the communities where we come from are worried about the following crime types, therefore produce a strategy to deal with them, and we will discuss such a strategy together.

When we have agreed on the strategy, we would then go back to the communities and say to them, “This month we want you to help us deal with the following”. That is how the issue of community police forums was conceptualised.

We then said that the people themselves would determine whether the police are doing their work. After some time, the police would go back to the communities and report back: “You remember, we came here last month and we said we were going to deal with this, that or the other? Here are the results of our work”, so that they are held accountable. That is how this thing was conceptualised. We are now going back to that.

You are correct that some of the CPFs do not fully understand their role, and have themselves assumed the position of being police officers. Indeed, that causes conflict, and we are now meeting with them to explain these things.

The CPFs must help to identify in the communities people who can be members of the reservist force and people who can be volunteers. Volunteers, among others, include doctors and nurses who go to the trauma sections of police stations and help people, particularly women and children who have been sexually abused. That is their main function. There has been a misunderstanding about that, which we are now trying to correct. So, that is the situation. Thank you, Chairperson.

Mr Z C NTULI: Chairperson, I am glad that the Minister has alluded to the piece of legislation that we are talking about. I would like to find out, when is it coming? I am worried about the fact that when it comes to CPFs, the police commissioner seems to have more powers than the Minister.

If you look at the police Act, it gives the Commissioner of Police the powers to establish CPFs, and all that. To my way of thinking, that is the competence of the Minister or the MEC at a provincial level, because this is a civilian issue.

I would be pleased if this piece of legislation could come, or we would be made aware as to when it is coming. I think there is a problem when you find that the Minister seems to have fewer powers than the commissioner, and I do not think it is correct.

The MINISTER OF SAFETY AND SECURITY: Chairperson, that is one of the things we are trying to correct with this law. As I say, hon members here know how long it takes to produce a piece of legislation. We have been told that in our focus, we must produce a, do we call it a Safety and Security Act?

It will have four pillars, and those are obviously the police; the oversight mechanism, including the ICD, that is the Independent Complaints Directorate; community policing, that is the forum itself; and the other elements of oversight. We defined each one and its role vis-à-vis policing in South Africa. It will be like that.

The CPFs, in terms of that piece of legislation, will indeed have the kind of authority we want them to have so that they do not rely on the police for the work that they must do. This they must do with the understanding that that work involves co-ordination of a relationship between the police and the people around the concept of community policing.

There are many areas where community policing is in place, and in those areas crime levels have gone down. To mention a few, there is Alexandra and Sebokeng in Gauteng, and many other areas. This is the consequence of community policing.

The Act, unfortunately, could not be finalised this year because of the short sessions that we have. However, I am sure that at some point next year it will be available. The Act will have to go through public hearings and all other processes. The initial steps will be made sometime next year. Thank you.

The HOUSE CHAIRPERSON (Mr T S Setona): Chairperson, the hon Minister has alluded to the tendency by CPFs and volunteers to feel entitled to be the first to be considered for appointment whenever positions are advertised within the Police Service, irrespective of requirements.

I want to believe that the hon Minister will agree that that is a very serious and pervasive culture in our society, and not only within the Police Service. Whenever posts are advertised in health care in local government, volunteers always feel that they are first in the line.

I want to check the extent to which your department, and government in general, has engaged the community in terms of conscientising our people to the culture of volunteerism, which I believe is a societal issue, as government alone cannot resolve it.

The MINISTER OF SAFETY AND SECURITY: Chairperson, that matter is of course very problematic, because we talk about it all the time. I don’t know whether people do not understand the way we explain things.

For instance, when you are a volunteer, you ought not to expect that you will get anything at the end of your voluntary work, but people expect to be given something. This arises as a consequence of the problems we have generally as a country, such as unemployment, poverty, etc. So, when people do work, they want to be employed.

What we ought to be able to do within the police - and we are working on this - is to explain fully to people regarding areas where they will be paid and areas where they will not be paid. We try to do this.

For instance, the only people that are paid in the Police Service are those who are reservists. Reservists are paid only to the extent of the work they have done. In other words, the regulation, as it stands, is that you will give so many hours of free service. I am uncertain about the number of hours, but you serve those hours for free. Thereafter, you are paid an allowance for every hour that you worked beyond the number of hours you needed to serve.

When I look at the regulation, people can make some kind of living around voluntary work, because the allowances are quite handsome. If you are a nurse and you want to go and give service at our trauma centres, you are volunteering your time and energy to help people; you can’t expect to be paid for that. We have major problems around the matter.

It is like elections. Ordinarily, if you are helping out during elections you are helping to consolidate democracy and, therefore, it is your revolutionary duty to assist, but people want to be paid when they do that kind of work. Of course, we do pay people when they do that kind of work. Thank you.

Mr R J TAU: Chair, I do not know if I will be making the Minister’s life easy or difficult in this instance. However, I appreciate the effort in responding to this very difficult question related to the spirit of voluntarism. The follow-up question is: Will the Minister agree with me - of course, we pick up these things during our programme of Taking Parliament to the People, especially with regard to voluntarism - that within civil society as well, we also find an irresponsible element within organisations, even political parties, that raises expectations amongst volunteers? I can quote, as an example, our recent visit to Sebokeng, where members of the public were told that the reason they are not employed as reservists or whatever, whenever there are vacancies, is because they are regarded as useless and that they are tools to be used by our government.

I don’t know if the hon Minister will agree with me that it is important that we make the call right now for organisations or civil society to refrain from irresponsible statements. Political parties, in particular, get very excited when some of these statements are made in public. Thank you very much.

The MINISTER OF SAFETY AND SECURITY: That was an observation. I will reserve my comments on that particular observation.

Funding and tendering procedure iro training of community police forum members

1. Kgoshi M L Mokoena (ANC) asked the Minister of Safety and Security:

   (1) What amount was used in training community police forum members in the 2007-08 financial year;

   (2) whether this function was outsourced; if not, why not; if so, (a) which company was awarded the tender, (b) how transparent was the tendering process and (c)(i) how many companies tendered and (ii) what are the names of those companies? CO1269E

The MINISTER OF SAFETY AND SECURITY: Chairperson, I’ve responded to some level with respect to the issue of the training of community police forums, and I’ve indicated that there’s no money involved. I’ve understood this question, but I don’t know if what I was doing is correct, Kgoshi, because my training in my other life tells me that there is a question you’re asking here, and unfortunately you have not given me the facts around it.

There is an issue you’re raising here and to that extent, therefore, I’d like to appeal to you to please indicate, not here, but do give me the information. There is specific information you have about abuse here. I would want to investigate that matter, because quite clearly there is something; if not criminal, highly mischievous. I’m appealing to you, therefore, to provide me with the relevant facts so that we can investigate this. We can’t allow anything like this. But as I say, the way I’ve read the question, and I’ve read it many times, I think there is a story behind this question.

I’m appealing to the hon members that we do not interrogate it now; we will be in touch with the hon member for me to have an understanding. There is something behind this question that needs to be investigated. Thank you.

The DEPUTY CHAIRPERSON OF THE NCOP (Ms P M Hollander): Thank you, hon Minister. Hon member, do you agree?

Kgoshi M L MOKOENA: Chairperson, I accept the advice from my calculated, dynamic Minister. I’ll do exactly that. Thank you. The DEPUTY CHAIRPERSON OF THE NCOP (Ms P M Hollander): Hon members, the presiding officers who preceded me have agreed that the Minister will also answer Questions 65 and 67.

         Renewal of contract of National Police Commissioner

1. Mr O M Thetjeng (DA) asked the Minister of Safety and Security:

   Whether the contract of the National Police Commissioner, Mr Jackie Selebi, will be renewed; if so, (a) for how long and (b) why? CO1283E

The MINISTER OF SAFETY AND SECURITY: Unfortunately, this is a matter that is handled by the President only. Therefore, I do not have any power and any information at this stage with respect to the issue of the extension of the contract of the National Commissioner. Thank you. Mr O M THETJENG: Ba sa nnyaka, bjale ba nkhumane. [They are still looking for me, and now they’ve got me.]

Chairperson, through you to the Minister, I had thought that when the Minister doesn’t have answers, there is always a consultation process so that we can be given those responses; answers which would come from the provinces, your officials or the President, in this instance, because we never have the opportunity to ask him such questions. I’ve thought it would come that way. [Interjections.] I would really appeal to the Minister, perhaps through him… [Interjections.]

The DEPUTY CHAIRPERSON OF THE NCOP (Ms P M Hollander): Order, please!

Mr O M THETJENG: They are interfering with my interaction with the Minister. I will request the Minister to assist me, because in this House we never have the opportunity to ask the President such questions. Thank you.

The DEPUTY CHAIRPERSON OF THE NCOP (Ms P M Hollander): Hon Thetjeng, firstly, that was not a follow-up. You said that you would request the Minister to assist you. In terms of the procedures, you can send that question to the Presidency. Either the President or the Deputy President can answer that question. That is my view in terms of the procedures of this House.

Mr O M THETJENG: Chairperson, can I rephrase it so that it becomes a question if it was confusing to you? I thought I was asking a question. It is just that English is my third language.

The DEPUTY CHAIRPERSON OF THE NCOP (Ms P M Hollander): Do you want to ask it as a follow-up to the question or to the answer that was given by the Minister?

Mr O M THETJENG: Yes. Minister, as a follow-up question: Is it possible for you to assist in finding out the procedure of getting the right information relating to this particular question and your response to the question?

The MINISTER OF SAFETY AND SECURITY: Chairperson, I’m actually very surprised. We get written questions. For instance, I answer written questions from the National Assembly and the NCOP. The President does the same. I don’t know why it would be difficult to ask the President that question in written form. Thank you.

      Equity in salaries of Scorpions staff and police members

1. Mr O M Thetjeng (DA) asked the Minister of Safety and Security:

   How will equity between the salaries of the Scorpions staff and the police members in the new unit be reached? CO1288E

The MINISTER OF SAFETY AND SECURITY: Chairperson, I think that question was partly answered by the Deputy Minister for Justice and Constitutional Development when he talked about the occupation-specific dispensation.

There is a task team which is comprised of senior managers at the Department for the Public Service and Administration and the police. That particular task team is looking at all issues relating to skills - how to attract and retain them. And this particular matter is also going to be the subject of some deliberation in that task team.

     Position regarding remuneration of officials on suspension

1. Kgoshi M L Mokoena (ANC) asked the Minister of Correctional Services:

(a) How many officials of his department are receiving salaries while
being at home, (b) how much money is being spent in this regard and (c)
when will this matter be resolved?       CO1270E

The MINISTER OF CORRECTIONAL SERVICES: Chairperson, it is a fundamental principle in labour law that an employee on precautionary suspension shall receive his or her basic remuneration, excluding allowances, whilst on suspension. This is in line with the principle of innocent until proven otherwise.

As of 31 March 2008, 117 employees were on precautionary suspension in the Department of Correctional Services. The occurrences of suspensions are commensurate with the seriousness of misconduct committed by staff. Against a staff establishment of 40 000 people, the ratio of suspensions is not out of hand.

The answer to subquestion (b) is that during their period of suspension R9 489 446, 32 in salaries have been paid to these employees. The periods of suspension differ from employee to employee.

The answer to subquestion (c) is that the department is trying its utmost to reduce the turnover time of suspensions. We recently engaged all regional managers in this regard. The Commissioner has also initiated the practice to assess senior managers based on their performance in reducing the turnover time of disciplinary hearings, appeals, suspensions and dealing with grievances.

Kgoshi M L MOKOENA: Chairperson, thank you very much, my excellent Minister, for the response and the honest manner in which they dealt with the question.

Arising out of that response, I want to find out whether this very same concern that we are raising – about these officials who are drawing salaries while they are sitting at home - does not affect service delivery in the department, because of the vacancies that are there in the department? Are there measures that you can put in place to try and expedite the finalisation of these suspensions by these officials? Some of them are even bragging and saying that unlike those who have to wake up early in the morning and go to work, they are enjoying their salaries while sitting at home.

The MINISTER OF CORRECTIONAL SERVICES: Chairperson, yes it does, Kgoshi Mokoena, but what we are trying to do is to push for an end to it. We have one regional commissioners’ forum that I have set up. This is where we try and push these regional commissioners at every meeting to come with the reports on suspensions so that we can deal with them and find out the reasons for all the delays. And, if it comes back to the following forum, then we know that something is wrong with the management style of that particular regional commissioner. Commissioners assess them on that because those are some of the things that they should deliver very quickly to ensure that these suspensions get out of the way.

Expediting these hearings could be done very quickly but sometimes even those that are suspended tend to delay the processes by coming up with excuses on this and that. But, again, we are trying our best to push them so that they are out of the way and that the department does not have to carry these people who are not assisting us in service delivery.

Number of sites opened or identified for the provision of antiretrovirals to inmates

1. Mr Z C Ntuli (ANC) asked the Minister of Correctional Services:

   How many sites have been (a) opened or (b) identified by his department that will provide antiretrovirals to inmates infected with or affected by HIV/Aids? CO1271E

The MINISTER OF CORRECTIONAL SERVICES: Chairperson, as we mentioned in the Budget Vote speech earlier this month, hon Z C Ntuli, the department has initiated a total onslaught against those offenders affected and infected by HIV and Aids.

In the past financial year, the department has aligned the HIV and Aids framework to the national HIV and Aids and Sexual Transmitted Infections, STI, Strategic Plan, which included the accreditation of more sites within the department. The rationale behind accelerating accreditation of more sites is to increase access to antiretroviral treatment within correctional centres and to nutrition as well. Currently, some offenders are accessing treatment from external health facilities.

The number of known HIV-positive sentenced male and female offenders is currently standing at 18 000 as at the end of March. The total number of offenders on antiretroviral treatment is 4 294, including those accessing treatment at external facilities. This represents 24% of offenders on treatment out of the total number that are infected. However, it is not all the offenders that qualify for treatment as per the Department of Health Standard Treatment Guidelines. It is assumed that the accreditation of comprehensive prevention, treatment, care and support centres where offenders have internal access to the antiretroviral therapy programme can reduce the number of offenders on the waiting list for treatment and, ultimately, prolong life.

However, we are faced with certain challenges that are not new to this country, such as the shortage of skilled personnel, shortage of professional nurses, medical doctors and the availability of qualified pharmacists that is hampering our accreditation process.

To come to your question, hon member, at this stage there are 16 accredited sites that exist within the department. In Gauteng we have Johannesburg, Sizophumelela; in Pretoria we have just launched a new one, the Tshepo Wellness Clinic; in the Western Cape we have Brandvlei; in the Eastern Cape we have East London, St Albans, Middledrift and Mthatha; in KwaZulu-Natal we have Qalakabusha, Pietermaritzburg Medium B, Durban Medium B, Kokstad Medium B, eBongweni complex, and Ncome Medium A and Medium B; in the Free State and Northern Cape we have Grootvlei, Kimberley, Groenpunt, and Kroonstad – 16 in all.

We envisage that in the future there will be an accredited site in each management area for access to the antiretroviral treatment and nutrition.

Mr Z C NTULI: Thank you, Chairperson, and thank you, hon Minister. I want to find out as to how they survive in those sites where there is no provision, do you transport them or what? I am thinking that if one is not in a correctional centre that is an accredited site then one cannot access antiretrovirals. Then one would think that it is better to go to where one can get access. How are they actually surviving?

The MINISTER OF CORRECTIONAL SERVICES: Chairperson, there are two things that happen. If one is in a facility that does not have an accredited site, we use the next site which could be nearest to the Department of Health; either a hospital or clinic. If one is closer to a site, like Durban- Westville, then one would be transported to Westville where one can access the benefits. So, those are the two ways that we use. If we bring them to the ones that are ours and closer to us, then the doctors can look after them there.

Mr N J MACK: Chairperson, when an inmate has been identified as someone who will be leaving in a month or two or even in six months and is on antiretrovirals, do you prepare him or her to get treatment outside, or what happens in that situation?

The MINISTER OF CORRECTIONAL SERVICES: Chairperson, yes there is a process, hon Mack. Even when we are going to release them on medical parole, we also release them on medical parole so that they should die at their homes with dignity. So, we refer them immediately. As soon as we know that within a month they are going to get medical parole, we look for the nearest place to where the offender is going to be released.

For instance, if an offender would be going to Alexandra we then look for a place there, together with the family. We don’t do it alone because the family has to be part and parcel of that. Then our doctors that we have at that particular site where we have referred the offender to would take care of them.

Kgoshi M L MOKOENA: Chairperson, I thank the Minister for the response. Arising from the Minister’s response, what happens in a situation where an offender was released on a medical parole – those we call terminally ill – only to find that six months down the line the offender fully recovers because they were put on the programme? What happens then? [Laughter.]

The MINISTER OF CORRECTIONAL SERVICES: Chairperson, I will take two examples here to answer the hon Kgoshi. If it is a medical parole and the doctors have given the go-ahead that this offender could be released on these grounds, of course, they are still under parole and therefore they would be checked on time and again. If they recover from that, then we cannot, my hon Kgoshi, bring them back because it was parole and was done in that spirit.

Secondly, if someone gets a straight parole and is not sick, he will only be taken back when he breaks some of the rules and conditions of his parole. But we cannot just say that because you seem to have recovered well and seem to be in good condition you must come back. That would not be right.

Mr R J TAU: Chairperson, my question was definitely the same as that one in terms of policy direction, whether we have a policy that clearly guides how we manage these things, and I think the response given by the Minister suffices.

Adequacy of number of doctors and social workers at correctional centres

1. Ms F Nyanda (ANC) asked the Minister of Correctional Services:

   Whether there are enough doctors and social workers at every correctional centre; if not, (a) why not and (b) how will his department address this challenge in each case? CO1272E

The MINISTER OF CORRECTIONAL SERVICES: Thank you very much, Chairperson. Hon member Nyanda, we need to agree that South Africa as a country is hard- hit by a shortage of scarce skills. I think hon De Lange discussed that and hon Nqakula also touched on that.

Owing to the environment in Correctional Services, it then becomes very difficult to attract and retain these scarce skills. Some professionals would find it difficult to stay in the kind of conditions one experiences working in Pollsmoor, being locked up in Pollsmoor the whole day or being locked up in any facility for that matter. Being in a security establishment is a very dangerous situation. Therefore, we cannot say that we have enough doctors and social workers; we don’t.

The department has created 15 posts for medical practitioners at different management areas. Currently, nine medical practitioners are employed at the following management areas: Pretoria and Johannesburg in Gauteng; Kroonstad and Grootvlei in the Free State; Pollsmoor and Brandvlei in the Western Cape; St Albans in the Eastern Cape; Pietermaritzburg in KwaZulu-Natal; and Kimberly in the Northern Cape.

The ideal is to employ at least one medical practitioner per correctional centre, if we could do that. However, owing to the scarcity of this category of health professionals in the country and the salary package in the public sector - hon De Lange did talk about this - the department is unable to recruit and retain them because we do not pay them enough. That is why we have come up with all these strategies.

To ensure the availability of medical services, these services are either rendered by full-time medical practitioners, such as those who have been allocated by the provincial departments of health - they help us with that

• or private medical practitioners who work with us on a sessional basis. If there are doctors out there who can work with us on a sessional basis, they are welcome.

The department has recently upgraded salaries of medical practitioners and we have broadened their scope of responsibility to ensure that medical services are also rendered at the different correctional centres within the management areas.

As for social workers, we now have the finance establishment that makes provision for 520 posts for social workers at correctional centres. Each correctional centre has a post for one or more social workers, depending on the capacity of that centre.

The Department for the Public Service and Administration has developed an occupation-specific dispensation for the professions experiencing critical scarce skills, including social workers. This new OSD for social workers will provide a more attractive salary package for recruitment and retention of social workers in the broad Public Service.

Correctional Services has also approved a recruitment and retention strategy which provides for more effective measures in terms of recruitment and retention of these critical skills, including social workers. Thank you very much.

Mnu N S S MQUNGQUTHU: Enkosi ngeli thuba, Sihlalo. Mphathiswa, mna bendifuna nje ukwazi ukuba, njengokuba ezi zakhono zinqabe kangaka phaya kwisebe lakho, ngaba amaqgirha okanye oosiyazi beningena kubasebenzisa na bona ukwenzela ukuba bacime aba bantu baphinde babagabhise, ngeli xesha nisasokolayo? Enkosi.

UMPHATHISWA WEENKONZO ZOLULEKO: Hayi, mandithethe inyaniso emsulwa: Andiqondi ukuba singakwazi ukubagatya abantu abanezo zakhono, ngoba neSebe lezeMpilo, ndijongile nje, liyabasebenzisa phaya naphaya. Ngoko ke, asinakho nje ukubakhuphela ecaleni kuba kaloku amanye amabanjwa ethu akholelwa kakhulu emayezeni asekhaya okanye awesintu nawemveli. Andiqondi ke ukuba sinokubachilela ecaleni ke, tata abo bantu. Apho banokusebenziseka khona, amagosa esebe aya kubona ukuba mawathini na ukubasebenzisa. (Translation of isiXhosa paragraphs follows.)

[Mr N S S MQUNGQUTHU: Thank you for this opportunity, Chairperson. Minister, I would like to know whether, given the acute skills shortage in your department, you would consider making use of the services of traditional healers, who would use traditional medicine to cleanse some inmates’ systems, for instance, while you are still struggling to recruit medical practitioners. Thank you.

The MINISTER OF CORRECTIONAL SERVICES: Speaking truthfully, I do not think that we can disregard people with such skills, because even the Department of Health makes use of them from time to time. Therefore, we cannot disregard the wishes of our inmates, because some of our inmates believe strongly in traditional medicine. There is no reason for us to turn traditional healers away. Departmental officials will decide how to make use of their services.]

Mr N J MACK: Chairperson and hon Minister, with the retention strategy today, I think many departments have these problems and they are not only looking at, as you call it, salary and wages money, they are looking at packages, to be more specific. Is there any incentive package other than money that we are looking at when trying to retain our people? Thank you.

The MINISTER OF CORRECTIONAL SERVICES: Chairperson, this morning there was a presentation to a portfolio committee of the NA about this particular issue of a retention strategy. I did not sit on it, but I do know that the Commissioner is looking at all those issues dealing with packages with some incentives here and there. As Deputy Minister De Lange has said, social workers and other workers have a tendency of reaching a certain ceiling and then branching off.

If you look at Correctional Services, for instance, most of the people who are managers are professionals. They should not be managing; they should actually be honing their skills in what they know best, rather than going off to manage. I can mention a number of them: Sis Jabu Sishuba, who retired from us, was a social worker but she was an Acting Commissioner for some time and we were in need of social workers.

We have the present Commissioner. He is a social worker. So, he should be leading the actual social workers in the department. Take a look at Gauteng. We have an advocate who is leading Gauteng, meanwhile we need to beef up our legal unit. So, one finds those types of problems. Even nurses in the department just take the other route and become managers. Then we are short of nurses. We do have that problem, all of us. I think it happens across all departments.

As Deputy Minister De Lange said: If there is a plan that any of our members and colleagues here can give us, we would really be jumping for joy, because it is difficult.

        Statistics relating to violation of parole conditions

1. Mr A T Manyosi (ANC) asked the Minister of Correctional Services:

   (a) How many ex-convicts or inmates who are out on parole have been found to have violated their parole conditions, (b) what action has been taken against them and (c) how many of them disappeared and cannot be traced? CO1273E The MINISTER OF CORRECTIONAL SERVICES: Chairperson, the hon member’s question appears to refer to the parolees, as opposed - if you read that question – to the number of ex-convicts or inmates. We do not have ex- convicts; we have parolees and ex-offenders. That is the language we use. Where is Mr Manyosi? He is not here.

The question does not indicate the period for which the information is required. I will therefore use the information from the past financial year as an indicator for the information required in this regard. During the period 1 April 2007 to March 2008, the daily active population of parolees in our community corrections was approximately 31 750 across the country. Over a period of a year, a total of 12 088 parole violations were registered.

At every community corrections office … I hope one day, Kgoshi, you will visit them with your select committee because we have a community corrections office right here, behind us, in the building next to the magistrates’ courts here. That is the one for Cape Town.

What we do on receipt of reports on violations is that every office makes written recommendations to the head of community corrections with regard to the adjustment of conditions; remember, every parolee has conditions. So, if there is a violation, we sit with that and try to find out what happened and then adjust here and there.

The investigation may reveal various reasons for violation of the parole conditions. For example, when for some or other reason a parolee violates any of his set of conditions, his/her parole is not necessarily revoked but the parolee must be called in for consultation in one of the following ways: verbally; telephonically; in writing; by letter or fax or per G306 warrant, which is the warrant that we use for the arrest of the parolee. We have the right to arrest that parolee and bring him or her in.

A sworn statement or written acknowledgement must be obtained from the parolee upon every violation of conditions so that it can be used as evidence should the correctional supervision or parole board or delegate thereof be approached for the revocation of parole. There must be something written so that when we revoke it we know exactly what he/she has written.

The parolee must take cognisance of verbal as well as written warnings in writing. The responsible official countersigns the verbal and written warnings. All actions and involvement are fully documented and placed in the file of the parolee. Each parolee has a file.

If a parolee has violated his/her conditions due to a technical reason, such as due to sickness, they must submit a certificate as proof during the interview with the supervision committee. In such a case, the committee will reprimand or warn the parolee. In the case where the parolee violates conditions without any reason or, on being requested to report to the supervising committee, fails to report there, one of the following steps is taken against him or her in consultation with the head of community corrections. It is not the Minister who deals with each and every parolee.

Sometimes when the opposition parties jump around and point fingers at the Minister, as if I deal with each and every parolee in the country, I just sit quietly and say, “Forgive them, Lord, for they know not what they are talking about.” [Laughter.]

Some of the things one does is to alter supervision conditions, with due consideration of those conditions that have already been set. You adjust conditions due to changed circumstances; put into operation suspended community service; intensify house detention and the grade of supervision; compel the parolee to attend additional programmes, and you give the instruction in writing to the parolee to appear before the community supervision or parole board or the commissioner.

When a parolee violates the conditions repeatedly without any reason, a report to this effect is compiled by the supervision committee and such a parolee is referred for correctional supervision to the parole board or to the commissioner for decision. So, these are all the steps that we take should anything go wrong with a parolee. During this period that I am talking about, 1 April 2007 to 31 March 2008, 1 522 parolees absconded from the system of community corrections. From this number a total of 991 were traced, and when traced, they were arrested and put in, and they start where they stopped with their sentence. A total of 542 are still at large. They can’t be at large for a very long time. We will get them back, and they will start where they ended. If you were paroled on 10 years going for 15 years, you will start at 10 years and continue to complete that 15, and there will be no parole for you because you don’t want to give yourself a second chance. Thank you.

Mr J W LE ROUX: Hon Minister, are the parole boards forced in any way to release a certain percentage of parolees? Is there any pressure put on them in that regard? Thank you.

The MINISTER OF CORRECTIONAL SERVICES: They are not forced at all. Nobody would force them. That is why we use people from the community and we use people of integrity as well so that we cannot actually put pressure on them. The only thing that we are harmonising is that they must look at at least 15 cases per day, and it does not mean that that 15 are going to be released. They have to look at what is there in the file and consider them. If not considered, you still stay behind; if considered, you will be given a date which will prepare you for a month before your release.

So nobody is forcing anybody to do anything. In the same breath, I must say that we cannot have parole board chairpersons who do not want to do their work - I know where the question comes from - because they believe that those people must sit and rot there. It cannot be like that. We had a situation in the Southern Cape where a parole board chair refused to look at any cases and came up with a story that she was forced to deal with these people and she did not want to deal with them. Why did she apply for the job in the first place then? She is gone now, finito. I fired her; end of the story, because I employed them.

The system of selecting is done by an interview panel, including members of the portfolio committee and the select committee. I do not sit in those and then I sign them off. Then they sit at home, they do not want to work and come with excuses that you are being forced. Oh please, go away! Stay at home. Why did you apply for the job?

Mr Z C NTULI: Minister, in our last engagement, I think that last year when you were talking about these rehabilitated offenders, you said you were thinking of having the community police forum, which is going to receive these people who are going to be in the community, prepare the ground so that they are accepted by the community when they come out. I want to find out whether you are still thinking along those lines or when is that going to happen?

The MINISTER OF CORRECTIONAL SERVICES: Chairperson, my belief is that there should really be something like that. But, with the approach that we are taking as government in terms of these community safety forums, I believe quite strongly that that team of people at local level should be able to assist us in this so that it is not a departmental approach, but a community or communal approach, so that they know that Ngconde Balfour, who has been an offender at Brandvlei, is now out and is at home. The CSF could call me in and say, ``You are back, brother. We expect this and this of you. We expect you to volunteer for this and do that and that as a way of assisting us in this social responsibility.’’ This social responsibility does not belong to the department; it is a societal, community responsibility to look after every person who is an ex-offender.

There are, however, ex-offenders who are doing very well at the moment. I have seen quite a number of them, and they report time and again on what they are doing, but the more we can push them towards that community safety forum, the better for us all so that we don’t duplicate any work that we do.

Mr R J TAU: The last question to the Minister brings us back to the thinking on how we ensure that we nurture, keep and develop the capacity that ex-offenders might have acquired while still in the correctional centres. I am speaking of my experience in my constituency. [Interjections.] Chair, for example, you have an ex-offender who has developed a keen interest in business. He has an idea, and all the plans are in place. He wants to provide services, interestingly, to the very same correctional centre that he is from. Balancing the question of black economic empowerment, whether it be in the form of co-operatives or small, medium and micro enterprises and so forth, what is it that the department can do to assist such offenders to also benefit from these contractual economic spin-offs that come from the kind of services that the department is giving? How can we as public representatives assist in organising and encouraging them to set up their companies and supply stationery to the correctional centre, or whatever, and earn a living to become a better person in society? Thank you very much.

The MINISTER OF CORRECTIONAL SERVICES: Baba, I will give you just one or two things. Do not worry when they say that you are an ex-offender. [Laughter.] It is not a problem. I am one, yes, and I look at correctional services not from the outside in, but rather from the inside out. That is how I look at it as an ex-offender myself, who still has his name in the books of some of the facilities that are now being looked at. You go to Drakenstein; you will find my name there. You go to Pollsmoor; you will find my name there. So, I am not looking at it from the outside but from the inside, and that is why I try and spend as much time as possible in correctional centres.

Coming back to the question, Bishop Tolo, for instance, picked up that in his constituency there was a young man who came out of prison with a number of good certificates that were given to him. On Budget Vote day in the National Assembly, we brought him there because we wanted him to tell his story of how he is now assisting his own community in dealing with some of the issues that are there.

Secondly, you will find that a number of ex-offenders are doing very well. With Kimberley Prison, which we are building now - I had the statistics here last week - we have employed about hundred and thirty-something offenders who are building the prison, but they are doing the building work as sub-contractors of what is going on there. That is the message I want to echo out there all the time.

When they come to us as Correctional Services, and we were the ones that actually assisted them with rehabilitation, we should be able to give them space to do work with us. There is nothing wrong in that, absolutely nothing wrong. But, to me, if they come together as a group – as they have done in Port Elizabeth, East London and in Gauteng – one can actually assist them better, rather than assisting them on an individual basis.

I am saying to area commissioners that when they come to them with this co- operative idea, which are ideas they got from us, assist them, please. Let them have something to live for.

        Implementation of recommendations of Jali Commission

1. Mr S Shiceka (ANC) asked the Minister of Correctional Services:

   Whether all the recommendations made by the Jali Commission have been implemented; if not, (a) why not and (b) when will they be implemented? CO1274E

The MINISTER OF CORRECTIONAL SERVICES: Chairperson, the commission’s report, the Jali Commission report, dealt with two categories of recommendations, namely the organisational systems and policies within the department and, secondly, disciplinary matters involving some officials. Most of the recommendations have been dealt with and the department has set itself a target of 31 December 2008 to complete all outstanding matters.

The response of the department regarding the main aspects of the report is as follows: Historical background; addressing of issues relating to transformation, if completed; issues raised to be addressed by the department; trade unionism within the department, not yet completed. Most of the matters relating to trade unionism have been addressed. The outstanding issue is the recommendation pertaining to the creation of a professional association for senior management. The department is not a separate entity detached from the rest of the public sector.

A decision relating to the creation of such an association rests with the Department of Public Service and Administration. This matter is currently being investigated by the DPSA, and the final implementation of this matter will depend on the finalisation of this matter by the DPSA.

With regard to gangsterism, we have not completed that and I am not sure if we will ever be able to, but we are trying our best. We have made significant progress to address the challenge of gangsterism within the SA correctional system. Extensive research has been conducted, particularly in the Western Cape, as part of the process that informs us of an antigang strategy. A draft manual on gangsterism has also been developed, and this will be consulted with external role-players, in due course, before implementation.

This will be followed by an intensive training and awareness campaign to empower staff, inmates and the community. The gangsters in our centres actually reflect on some of the things that happen in society. Some of them have very strong links with the communities where they live. They are known to be gangsters where they live. Even the groups they belong to, whether 28 or 27, are known. The communities do not deal with it through the community police forums and CCSFs to let them know that their conduct is not acceptable. They either stay or leave the community.

The recruitment and merit awards are not yet completed. Correctional centre security is not yet completed, but most of the recommendations pertaining to security have been addressed. The department is currently in the process of installing the Integrated Technological Systems in various centres. In some of the centres there is electronic access control using the fingertip and CCTV. The old, big padlocks are no longer used. No more “dankie, hekke” [thank you, gates].

Regarding the treatment of offenders, this is mainly to ensure that offenders are treated humanely and, amongst others, referred to offenders’ tribunals. We segregate the offenders. We use C-Max facilities and the provision of a three-meal system. The amendment of legislation relating to offenders’ tribunals and segregation were addressed in the new Correctional Services Amendment Bill, which came to this House and was referred back to the National Assembly for adoption.

We are currently reviewing the operational procedures and selection criteria for admission in C-Max facilities. Compliance with the three-meal system in terms of intervals that are prescribed by the Act differs from centre to centre, depending on the availability of resources.

We will strictly comply with the legislation after the seven-day working week system has been fully implemented. It starts on 1 July 2008. I had a meeting this morning in Goodwood with the heads of correctional centres in the Western Cape about the starting of the seven-day working week system and we will begin with two centres for pilot purposes.

Sexual violence and the protection of vulnerable offenders from any kind of sexual violence is under way. We have just mentioned paroles. The conversion of sentences is dealt with, with the review of the justice system. We have a new Acting Judge, Judge Deon van Zyl, in the position of the inspectorate, and it is performing very well.

We are dealing with overcrowding through the remand centre system. We are going to separate remand centres from sentenced offenders so that they can be on their own. This will help us to deal with them through the parole system. It is quite a long list, and I would submit some of these to hon Shiceka for his perusal.

Statistics relating to suspension of departmental officials owing to
                             corruption

1. Mr A L Moseki (ANC) asked the Minister of Defence:

   (a) How many officials of his department have been suspended because of corruption, (b) how serious are these cases, (c) how many officials are involved in each case and (d) when will these cases be finalised? CO1275E

The DEPUTY MINISTER OF DEFENCE: Chairperson, currently there are no officials in the department who have been suspended on charges of corruption. As compared to what we have heard from my colleagues, you can see that there is a big difference. The numbers range from 117 and so on. [Laughter.]

There were two cases which were dealt with in court and both offenders were found guilty. Once found guilty of corruption, you are immediately expelled. The other one has lodged an appeal and we are awaiting the findings. As I have said, currently there are no corruption charges against any of our officers.

            Measures to deal with qualified audit report

1. Mr A L Moseki (ANC) asked the Minister of Defence:

   (1) What measures will be taken to deal with the qualified audit report received by his department;

   (2) whether the internal audit committee of his department has been found to be effective; if not, what is the position in this regard; if so, what are the relevant details? CO1276E The DEPUTY MINISTER OF DEFENCE: The office of the Secretary for Defence has developed initiatives that are aimed at addressing the root causes of the qualified audits. The focus is on identifying quick ways which will form the basis for a sustainable long-term turnaround strategy. The initiatives in place are: A team dealing with Operation Clean Audit has been put in place, monthly meetings are held, and significant progress has been made on issues that can be cleared in the short term.

A project team working on the logistics intervention and repositioning programme started functioning in 2000 to address qualifications relating to logistics, asset management, inventory management and accruals. Those who have seen our qualified audits will realise that that is the major source of our qualifications. Fraud awareness seminars were conducted in the department throughout the country to address issues of theft, fraud, losses and corruption.

Section 45 of the Public Finance Management Act which deals with the training of nonfinancial officers and financial officers has been rolled out throughout the department. The process of acquiring an external audit firm to assist in clearing the audit qualification, designing and implementing an enhanced internal system is at an advanced stage. The firm will start before the middle of July.

The medium to long-term audit qualifications which are dependent on the integrated financial management systems will be resolved when this new system is implemented.

The department has no internal audit committee. However, there is an audit committee which has been constituted as prescribed by the Public Finance Management Act, section 77, read with Treasury Regulation 3.1.1 to 3.1.12. This audit committee is effective and it comprises of five external members and two internal members.

During the 2007-08 financial year, five meetings were held, of which one was special. During the 2007-08 financial year, the audit committee reviewed and discussed the audited annual financial statements to be included in the annual report with the Auditor-General and the accounting officer; reviewed the Auditor-General’s management letter and management response thereto; reviewed changes in accounting policies and practices; and reviewed significant adjustments resulting from audit.

Five audit committee meetings are scheduled for the 2008-09 financial year. The first meeting took place on 6 June 2008, and on 30 July 2008 the audited financial statement will be discussed at the special audit committee meeting. Thank you.

Kgoshi M L MOKOENA: Thank you, Chairperson and thank you to my Deputy Minister for the concise response. We are glad that there is a move to try and address some of these anomalies that cause the department to get these qualified audit reports. What I want to find out, arising from the hon Deputy Minister’s response, is: Is it not worrying for the political heads in this department when this department receives qualified reports because of the line items that were identified by the Auditor-General for three to four consecutive years and those issues are not yet addressed? If it is worrying for the Deputy Minister and the Ministry, what action is going to be taken against those who are supposed to address the particular issues and are not doing so?

The DEPUTY MINISTER OF DEFENCE: Thank you, Kgoshi Mokoena. It is a fact that the issue of qualified statements in the department has been a major problem. I think about two years ago, we even called the Auditor-General to come to the office to speak to the Secretary for Defence, the chief financial officer, and many others, because we were trying to assist them. We were hoping that something new was going to happen, but unfortunately the following year the same thing happened.

We are trying to restructure the department primarily because of the logistics. One of the weaknesses which we are trying to address is that if one buys military equipment, one cannot do so without buying spare parts without knowing when they will be used. Therefore, in terms of the military, it will be risky to buy military equipment without making sure that there are spares, which might lie there for five years without being used. This also creates problems. We are trying to design modern methods where this will be addressed.

Recently, we decided to tell people that if things do not change, they will be fired. We have always been nice to people and they have not taken us seriously. After a series of meetings with them nothing was done, so we are starting to put pressure on them, especially the Secretary for Defence, because he is the accounting officer. All these other people, like the CFO, report to him. We have written to him to inform him that if he does not take his work seriously, we shall have no alternative but to act.

I know, Kgoshi Mokoena, it is very frustrating. We have been talking to you as a committee. We have held meetings, and what is frustrating is that sometimes we think we have found a solution and then we realise six months later that what we have agreed upon has not been done. Those are the problems, but we are working on them.

Position regarding vacant key or technical positions in SA National Defence Force

1. Mr N J Mack (ANC) asked the Minister of Defence:

   (a) How many key or technical positions in the SA National Defence Force are vacant because of resignations or poaching by the private sector or other countries, (b) how are these vacancies affecting service delivery and (c) how is the SANDF countering the moves to other countries? CO1277E

The DEPUTY MINISTER OF DEFENCE: What I will do, Mr Mack, is to leave a copy for you. The question which you have asked is a very elaborate one because this is one of our biggest problems in the department. In fact, it is costing us a lot of money. We are not like other departments; most of our technical staff are trained by us. For example, we have two types of pilots in the department. We have a transport pilot like the one who can be taken by SAA at any given time. We also have a fighter pilot; the one based in Makhado and is trained for war. To train a pilot costs millions.

Our system stipulates that if a person is trained by the department that person must stay in the department for a particular period. But if one is bought out one must pay a certain amount, which is less than the money which the department spent in training that individual. That is where we are losing. We’ve got a lot of technicians that we train in the SA Air Force, SA Navy, SA Army and the SA Military Health Service, SAMHS.

Most of the people that we train are poached, sometimes internally, by the various companies. The poaching is now serious and it is even done by foreign countries, especially countries like Australia. Poaching is cheaper and easier because it is very expensive to train these technicians. According to the statistics that we have summarised, in the Navy alone there are 316 vacancies, 1 400 in the SA Air Force, 469 in SAMHS and 81 in the SA Army.

This is so bad, especially when it comes to the issue of parachutists. African countries and other countries like Singapore used to send their parachutists here for training in Bloemfontein. However, due to the shortage of technical staff that programme is experiencing problems because there are no technicians to service the aircraft that are used to train parachutists. Service delivery is at its optimal level but it is seriously affected by the shortage of technicians.

The maintenance of equipment in all services is not optimal. Standard maintenance tasks take longer. Because of the importance of what is happening I have called an urgent meeting with the Chief of Staff and others to discuss what we can do. This hampers the provision of certain clinical services at some bases.

We have started discussing a retention strategy but, unfortunately, the retention strategy costs money. We have started it in the SA Air Force but we are still losing because there are still 1 400 vacancies.

We have also started to look at some benefits. At the moment we are developing a remuneration package for the military.

The HOUSE CHAIRPERSON (Mr T S Setona): Deputy Minister, may I warn that you summarise because your time for replying has actually expired.

The DEPUTY MINISTER OF DEFENCE: What we are also doing is to train more so that there can be a stage when those South African companies who are taking our technicians will not need them anymore. That does not work because they are now taken by foreign countries, and that complicates our problem.

Mr R J TAU: In actual fact, after listening to the Minister, this brings one to another issue, which is: On the basis of the observations you have made, isn’t there a need for a policy shift in terms of the retention strategy; not necessarily at the level of remuneration, because we are investing? If we do not have a policy shift that seeks to ensure that whatever skill we train, whatever investment we make we are able to retain it within the system, I anticipate another security load shedding in the future.

This really presents a security risk, where we are going to lose so many highly technical staff that we have invested so much in as a country. So, I think maybe we don’t even need legislation or to wait for legislation. Can’t we look into the question of regulations that govern the retention of skills within the SA Army so that we don’t see this exodus of our technical staff?

If one simply interprets what the Minister raises, one can arrive at the conclusion that there is a globalisation of recruiting army personnel and skills and the target is the developing countries. Perhaps, South Africa is the entry point of this process that seeks to weaken the developing countries in the area of technical staff and skills. Therefore, as a follow- up question I would like to know whether there isn’t a need now for a policy shift to ensure that we become much stronger in order to retain these skills? Thanks.

The DEPUTY MINISTER OF DEFENCE: As I have said, this is one of our biggest challenges. We are looking at a lot of things. One of them is to move away from allowing a person to be bought after we have trained him or her. For example, we want to introduce a regulation that stipulates that if the department trains a person for five years, that person must stay in the department for five years. But this still does not solve the problem because the personnel will just wait patiently for five years and then leave.

This is the case especially with regard to pilots. Pilots are judged by the number of hours they have accumulated flying. The more hours the pilot has accumulated, the more in demand that pilot is.

So, even if you, the legislators, can think of something, we will welcome it because it is a big challenge. Furthermore, because of the element of globalisation that hon Tau referred to, I must be honest with you, we do not have answers. Measures to ensure no repetition of Lohatla incident

1. Ms F Nyanda (ANC) asked the Minister of Defence:

   (1) Whether any measures have been put in place to ensure that what had happened at Lohatla in the Northern Cape does not happen again; if so, what measures;

   (2) whether these measures have proved to be effective; if not, why not; if so, what are the relevant details? CO1278E

The DEPUTY MINISTER OF DEFENCE: Chair, firstly, I did not understand the question but I have to start by saying that what happened at Lohatla was an accident. I think we did inform both the select committee and the joint committee.

A critical mechanical failure occurred on Gun 124 when the interface between the hand-mortar actuator selector lever and the traverse gearbox broke during engagement. This was caused by a spring pin that sheared and disengaged the control mechanism, rendering the gun uncontrollable when it was fired. This caused the gun to swing to the left for approximately two seconds, expending high explosives and trace rounds on adjacent people and equipment.

With those guns one can kill as many people as possible in one second. So, imagine what could happen in two seconds. The gun product was decommissioned immediately after the incident. That’s all we could do. We based our finding on the board of inquiry and technical committee recommendations and no live firing will take place until such time as all possible avenues have been addressed and rectified.

You must understand that we will also have to talk to the company, - which is a foreign company, because this lever or spring pin was not listed as part of what could one say was a serviceable part.

Furthermore, the board issued an implosion instruction, tasking all the role-players to formulate various plans addressing those shortcomings identified by the board of inquiry. So, because it starts even from the manufacturer, we are now finding a solution.

On receipt of this implementation instruction, rectification plans were drafted and work sessions took place where these plans were refined and ownership was coupled. This process has not yet been completed because we are dealing here with equipment that is very dangerous. You must make sure that everything involves, again, technicians.

It is too early to report on the effectiveness of these measures because they have not even been implemented. Many role-players are involved, including Armscor and the South African Army. All parties took ownership of ensuring that this type of incident will not happen again.

As I am saying, this was one incident. An incident is a very terrible thing and one might say it will not happen again. It is like having a tyre burst on the road, but you then say you must make sure that you do not have a tyre burst again. The only way of making sure that you do not have a tyre burst again is to drive at 90 km/h. You still have a tyre burst and it looks like this thing of 90 km is not working.

Some say it is a very complicated matter. Even when one feels that one has the answer, namely, that we need to train soldiers on how to use live ammunition. Otherwise, if we do not train them on live ammunition when we take them to war they will run away because, unfortunately, once those big military guns start firing into the air, “dhoom”, they will run away. At the moment we are working on the plan.

Mr B J TOLO: Hon Minister, I am just saying that in other instances there would be blanks that would make the same sound as live ammunition. Therefore, why do we not use blanks that are able to simulate live ammunition?

The DEPUTY MINISTER OF DEFENCE: Mr Tolo, we do use blanks.

The HOUSE CHAIRPERSON (Mr T S Setona): Hon Deputy Minister, could I please make a ruling here, with due respect. Hon Tolo, could we take your issue really as an advice to the department because I am afraid that we are getting into the technical aspects of …

The DEPUTY MINISTER OF DEFENCE: No, it is a short question because in the department we do use blanks for practice. But, if you want to produce an army that can fight a war you still have to use live ammunition. Because, like I am saying, we use simulators and blanks for practice but we still have to use live ammunition because when you train soldiers they must be in war mode.

The HOUSE CHAIRPERSON (Mr T S Setona): Hon members know that hon Tolo is a trained military man. So, I was afraid that he might get into the finer details of these things. That was my concern.

Kgoshi M L MOKOENA: Thanks, Chairperson, and thanks to the Deputy Minister for the response. Chair, I must first thank the Deputy Minister for being honest and frank about what happened there. The follow-up question that arises from that response is whether a finger cannot be pointed at the country we acquired this ammunition from, Chair, because based on the preliminary investigations and the reports that were given to the committee it is not a question of our officers having blundered or made a mistake; it was a technical fault with the very same equipment. I am saying the country from which we acquired this ammunition really, I think, must say something to us as a country. Can I please check that with the Minister?

The DEPUTY MINISTER OF DEFENCE: Well, Kgoshi, there is communication between us and the country but we have also to tread carefully. You see, we have information that this pin once also broke off in one of the European countries. This is now the second time, and whether now that is enough grounds for us is a matter which is being discussed by the legal people. The problem with this pin is when you buy military equipment, the serviceable parts and everything are bought accordingly from a book, and this pin was not on the service list. But the question of course that people are asking is: If this happened in one country in Europe, why did this company not inform us about this? This is the matter which the lawyers are dealing with. It involves all sorts of things and it could even lead to litigation, but at the moment we are still working on it.

      Position regarding outsourcing of departmental functions

1. Mr A L Moseki (ANC) asked the Minister of Defence:

   (a) Which functions of his department are outsourced, (b) why are they outsourced and (c) how much is his department paying to these private entities? CO1279E

The DEPUTY MINISTER OF DEFENCE: We’ve got a list again. When you talk about outsourcing, I would assume that you mean these services. I mean, in defence we don’t outsource anything. If we want to fight a war, we send our own soldiers. So, there is nothing that we are outsourcing.

But there are a lot of small things such as gardening and cleaning which you outsource, you employ a private company. I have been given a list here, Mr Moseki. I will give you this list because we honestly deal with all things that have nothing to do with defence.

We must understand that the core business of defence is to defend the integrity and protect the citizens of this country against foreign ogres. We cannot outsource it to anybody. We do it ourselves. You can’t have soldiers working as cleaners and gardeners. So, that we have to outsource. We’ve got areas where – for instance, a base on the other side of Soweto – we are moving out. Since there are properties there, we would have to hire a private security company to make sure that those buildings and properties that are there are properly looked after in the process of us transferring them back to Public Works. So, if you look at that you’ll need the security, laundry, all those small things that have nothing to do with our core business. Otherwise, in our core business we don’t outsource anything.

REPLY a) Kindly refer to the attached schedule for details. b) Because it is not cost effective to perform such function in-house. c) The grand total for outsourcing is R580 059 452 over a period of ± three years.

The HOUSE CHAIRPERSON (Mr T S Setona): Can I make the ruling that this question is of a statistical nature by all measures and standards, and in terms of the Rules and procedures of the council. I was actually lenient to have allowed it to be responded to. Your initial intervention to say that you’ll hand over the written reply to the hon member and the House was appropriate and this is the ruling that I’m making in that regard. Thank you.

Mr R J TAU: Chairperson, I think this question, much as I did not have the benefit of discussing it with the hon Moseki, is very strategic in the sense that it has to do with elements of the second economy and of black economic empowerment. Perhaps, if the question would have been that to what extent … [Interjections.]

The HOUSE CHAIRPERSON (Mr T S Setona): Hon member, you are out of order; could you take your seat.

Mr R J TAU: Chairperson, it’s not a new question. It’s about outsourcing, about private sector involvement.

The HOUSE CHAIRPERSON (Mr T S Setona): Hon member, could you take your seat, please! I must make a ruling.

Hon member, I have made a ruling on this issue. You are at liberty, in the next question session, to strategise that question and put it to the hon Minister. From what I’m reading – unless I’m contested, and you are yourself saying it could have been couched differently – as it is couched in a statistical manner, this is my ruling. I’m saying the hon Minister would forward this thing. I’m not going to accept that my ruling be contested, hon members … [Interjections.]

Kgoshi M L MOKOENA: On a point of order: As oversight practitioners, we are dealing with departments. They are giving us some stats about outsourcing some of these things, and tenders are being given to friends and everybody. There are people who are not supposed to benefit from some of these things. Now, when we say these are of a statistical nature, it’s an insult to some of us who, as a committee, are dealing with these departments.

I know that the Deputy Minister is aware of what I’m talking about because he also raised some concerns during some of our meetings. With due respect, don’t do so, especially to some of us as members. Nobody is having a monopoly of mind in this House. Please, respect us as members!

The HOUSE CHAIRPERSON (Mr T S Setona): Member, there is no issue of monopoly of the House. You are out of order, and I sustain my ruling. Thank you.

Mr B J TOLO: You are saying that you are presiding officers. If you have a problem with questions, then those questions should not be printed on the Order Paper because all questions that are printed on the Order Paper members have the right to entertain. They are brought by you into this House, you cannot then come and say no these questions should not be responded to. Thank you.

The HOUSE CHAIRPERSON (Mr T S Setona): There’s a regulation that deals with questions but we will deal with this issue in the next sitting. Presiding officers do not bring questions to the House. We have a Questions Office. The Deputy Minister himself was even reluctant to deliberate further on this, hence he said that he would supply a written answer. I am making a ruling on that basis. That is a normal convention here. It is not a judgement either on the author of the question or any member, and it has got nothing to do with anything about wisdom, hon Kgoshi Mokoena. It is a matter of procedure, and that procedure must be respected. It’s a procedure that binds everybody, irrespective of their position in this House. And I really want to appeal to hon members to accept it as it is. I’m closing this issue on that note.

Position regarding the introduction of legislation to prohibit security forces from participating in elections

1. Mr O M Thetjeng (DA) asked the Minister of Defence:

   Whether he intends introducing legislation that will prohibit security forces from participating in elections; if so, (a) when and (b) what are the further relevant details? CO1284E

The DEPUTY MINISTER OF DEFENCE: Comrade Chair, the problem is this question is vague, so the answer would also be vague. For instance, Kgoshi was saying, if this question was dealing with tenders then that’s different because tenders to us is not outsourcing; it is something you do when you are undertaking a special project.

The question is whether he intends introducing legislation that will prohibit security forces from participating in elections. We had to take the easier route, but the question could have meant two things: Do soldiers participate in the elections and do they assist with the voting process? Do soldiers participate in elections in terms of being deployed? The question does not say that, and then we said: No. We have no intention of introducing legislation that will prohibit security forces from participating in elections.

Section 19(3)(a) of the Constitution determines that “Every adult citizen has the right to vote in elections for any legislative body established in terms of the Constitution, and to do so in secret”. Section 199(7) of the Constitution also determines that none of the security services members, when performing their duties, should

a) prejudice a political party interest that is legitimate in terms of
   the Constitution; or
b) further, in a partisan manner, any interest of a political party.

In addition to this, section 52(7)(a) to (c) of the Defence Act of 2002 determines that no member of the regular force may –

a) further or prejudice the political interest of any political party
   in the performance of his or her functions;
b) be politically partisan, or express any party-political allegiance,
   in the performance of his or her functions; or
c) hold any position other than that of ordinary member in any
   political party.

The Constitution and the Defence Act make provision for circumstances in which the President or the Minister of Defence, as the case may be, may deploy the Defence Force. I’m trying to cover both. They may employ the Defence Force if there are elections, as a back-up to the police. The powers and duties of the Defence Force while being deployed are also determined by the Defence Act. When they are deployed to assist the police, the role they play is that of a back-up force and they cannot be in the forefront, unless the situation gets worse. Even in the elections that’s exactly what happened. Thank you.

Mr O M THETJENG: Thank you, Minister, for the answer. The intention was that you should look at the voting part of the elections. We are seeing South Africa’s democracy and what is happening across the borders, where soldiers are actually taking a proactive role in politics. The follow-up question is: Despite the issues that are related in the Constitution, for us to ensure that our democratic process is well protected without soldiers getting involved in voting for one party or the other and them remaining as neutral as possible. That is the way in which the question was actually put in terms of looking at that. We have soldiers that are 100% neutral in every aspect. That’s why we are asking if there is any plan to amend legislation and to ensure that they remain where they are and defend any other person who comes into governance.

The DEPUTY MINISTER OF DEFENCE: Hon member, I believe that you do not repair a car unless you realise that there is a fault or that it is broken. So far, the system as I have explained, according to the Constitution and the Defence Act, has worked perfectly. Soldiers at the moment know that they can only vote. In terms of other deployments, they do not participate in any politics.

Of course, we have a problem that we are addressing and that is the issue of the unions. The issue of unions is a very dicey situation at the moment, but even there the regulations are very clear. That is why we told SASFO when they affiliated to Cosatu that you either get out or we don’t recognise you. Cosatu is politically allied. If you are affiliated to Cosatu you are to a large extent associated with the SACP and the ANC. The unions in the Defence Force are different from the unions in the private sector. Their job is to look at issues of grievance procedures that they have followed, and what not to do. We have warned them that if they start to march and toyi-toyi, they might get into a situation where we have to deal with them.

They understand, and we read the regulations to them, especially during the strike. They tried to take a chance; we called them into the office, we read the regulations, they understood and brought their leaders and said: “If you do what you are saying, then we can tell you now that it is not even going to a disciplinary because you will all be fired.” Of course, they took it seriously. They did not do it because they must maintain neutrality. This is one of the biggest back-up forces for security in the country and it cannot be associated with any such behaviour. Even the SADC and the AU are against it because once you involve soldiers in politics you are going to have coups and all those things that are undemocratic. [Interjections.]

The HOUSE CHAIRPERSON (Mr T S Setona): Thank you, hon Deputy Minister. In the absence of further follow-up questions, the questions session is now concluded.

See also QUESTIONS AND REPLIES.

REPEAL OF THE BLACK ADMINISTRATION ACT AND AMENDMENT OF CERTAIN LAWS
                           AMENDMENT BILL

            (Consideration of Bill and of Report thereon)

Dr F J VAN HEERDEN: Chairperson, it rarely happens that I get ten minutes and I’m going to use some of the ten minutes, which is at least more than the three minutes which I usually get. I was not sure whether I was in Polokwane when there were some interventions when you made a ruling or whether this was the NCOP, but be that as it may, another observation is that apparently many members, maybe myself included, suffer from list fever.

Ons noem dit in Afrikaans sommer “lyskoors”. [In Afrikaans we simply call it “lyskoors”.]

Not lust fever but list fever. You must show that you are indispensable so that you come back to this place.

Before I get to the statement, another matter is that maybe it is interesting for other members, not members of our committee, to know how we work in the Safety and Security committee. We are a committee where members ask a lot of questions, and there is nothing wrong with asking questions.

The HOUSE CHAIRPERSON (Mr T S Setona): Hon member, I don’t think you are addressing the Bill.

Dr F J VAN HEERDEN: I’m working towards it. I have ten minutes, Chairperson.

The HOUSE CHAIRPERSON (Mr T S Setona): Time is important and I’ve just received an announcement that affects all members and it is from the Chairperson’s office. For some of us time is very important. Continue, please.

Dr F J VAN HEERDEN: Chairperson, the other thing is that before asking questions it also became a custom in our committee that there is a very long introduction or preamble or a preface, even before a question is being put.

But now to get back to this particular Bill, it caused a controversy because there was no opportunity to ask a lot of questions. The reason is because the purpose of this Bill was just to amend and substitute a date. The recommendation of the committee is that the House endorses this and approves this amendment. It’s just a date that has been changed from July 2008 to 30 December 2009.

The reasons are that the Traditional Courts Bill seeks to regulate matters dealt with in sections 12 and 20 of the Black Administration Act 1927 and it is foreseen that the Traditional Courts Bill will not be signed into law by the deadline of 30 June 2008. Consequently, this Bill seeks to extend the date of the application of the provisions of this section and that the date be moved to 30 December 2009. There was no contention as far as the date was concerned but there was contention about the fact that we couldn’t interact with questions and long interviews. Thank you.

Debate concluded.

Bill agreed to in accordance with section 75 of the Constitution. The Council adjourned at 17:28. ____

            ANNOUNCEMENTS, TABLINGS AND COMMITTEE REPORTS

                        FRIDAY, 20 JUNE 2008

ANNOUNCEMENTS

National Assembly and National Council of Provinces

The Speaker and the Chairperson

1. Draft Bills submitted in terms of Joint Rule 159

(1)    National House of Traditional Leaders Bill, 2008, and
     Traditional Leadership and Governance Framework Amendment Bill,
     2008, submitted by the Minister for Provincial and Local
     Government.


  Referred to the Portfolio Committee on Provincial and Local
     Government and the Select Committee on Local Government and
     Administration.

1. Introduction of Bills

 (1)    The Minister of Foreign Affairs
      a) Diplomatic Immunities and Privileges Amendment Bill [B 55 –
         2008] (National Assembly – proposed sec 75) [Explanatory
         summary of Bill and prior notice of its introduction published
         in Government Gazette No 31170 of 20 June  2008.]


         Introduction and referral to the Portfolio Committee on
         Foreign Affairs of the National Assembly, as well as referral
         to the Joint Tagging Mechanism (JTM) for classification in
         terms of Joint Rule 160.


         In terms of Joint Rule 154 written views on the classification
         of the Bills may be submitted to the JTM within three
         parliamentary working days.


(2)    The Minister for Provincial and Local Government


      a) National House of Traditional Leaders Bill [B 56 – 2008]
         (National Assembly – proposed sec 76) [Explanatory summary of
         Bill and prior notice of its introduction published in
         Government Gazette No 31108 of 3 June 2008.]


      b) Traditional Leadership and Governance Framework Amendment Bill
         [B 57 – 2008] (National Assembly – proposed sec 76)
         [Explanatory summary of Bill and prior notice of its
         introduction published in Government Gazette No 31108 of 3
         June 2008.]


         Introduction and referral to the Portfolio Committee on
         Provincial and Local Government of the National Assembly, as
         well as referral to the Joint Tagging Mechanism (JTM) for
         classification in terms of Joint Rule 160.
         In terms of Joint Rule 154 written views on the classification
         of the Bills may be submitted to the JTM within three
         parliamentary working days.


 (3)    The Minister of Health


      a) Medical Schemes Amendment Bill [B 58 – 2008] (National
         Assembly – proposed sec 75) [Explanatory summary of Bill and
         prior notice of its introduction published in Government
         Gazette No 31114 of  2 June  2008.]


         Introduction and referral to the Portfolio Committee on Health
         of the National Assembly, as well as referral to the Joint
         Tagging Mechanism (JTM) for classification in terms of Joint
         Rule 160.
         In terms of Joint Rule 154 written views on the classification
         of the Bills may be submitted to the JTM within three
         parliamentary working days.

1. Classification of Bills by Joint Tagging Mechanism (JTM)

(1)    The JTM in terms of Joint Rule 160(6) classified the following
     Bills as section 75 Bills:

      a) Provision of Land and Assistance Amendment Bill [B 40 – 2008]
         (National Assembly – sec 75).

      b) National Strategic Intelligence Amendment Bill [B 38 – 2008]
         (National Assembly – sec 75).

      c) South African National Water Resources Infrastructure Agency
         Limited Bill [B 36 – 2008] (National Assembly – sec 75).


(2)    The JTM in terms of Joint Rule 160(6) classified the following
     Bills as section 76 Bills:

      a) National Qualifications Framework Bill [B 33 – 2008] (National
         Assembly – sec 76).

      b) Land Use Management Bill [B 27 – 2008] (National Assembly –
         sec 76).

TABLINGS

National Assembly and National Council of Provinces

1. The Minister for Justice and Constitutional Development

   (a) Government Notice No R561 published in Government Gazette No 31076 dated 22 May 2008: Criminal Law (Sexual Offences and Related Matters) Regulations in terms of the Criminal Law (Sexual Offences and Related Matters) Amendment Act, 2007 (Act No 32 of 2007).

                       MONDAY, 23 JUNE 2008
   

COMMITTEE REPORTS

National Assembly and National Council of Provinces

CREDA INSERT REPORT - T080623e–insert1 PAGES 1339-1360.

                        TUESDAY, 24 JUNE 2008

ANNOUNCEMENTS

National Assembly and National Council of Provinces The Speaker and the Chairperson

1. Bills passed by Houses – to be submitted to President for assent

(1)    Bills passed by National Council of Provinces on 24 June 2008:


      a) Repeal of the Black Administration Act and Amendment of
         Certain Matters Amendment Bill [B 50 – 2008] (National
         Assembly – sec 75)

1. Draft Bills submitted in terms of Joint Rule 159

(1)    Mineral and Petroleum Resources Royalty (Administration) Bill,
     2008, submitted by the Minister of Finance.
  Referred to the Portfolio Committee on Finance and the Select
     Committee on Finance.

1. Introduction of Bills

 (1)    The Minister of Finance


      a) Mineral and Petroleum Resources Royalty Bill [B 59 – 2008]
         (National Assembly – proposed sec 77).


      b) Mineral and Petroleum Resources Royalty (Administration) Bill
         [B 60 – 2008] (National Assembly – proposed sec 75)
         [Explanatory summary of Bill and prior notice of its
         introduction published in Government Gazette No 31164 of 19
         June 2008.]


         Introduction and referral to the Portfolio Committee on
         Finance of the National Assembly, as well as referral to the
         Joint Tagging Mechanism (JTM) for classification in terms of
         Joint Rule 160.
         In terms of Joint Rule 154 written views on the classification
         of the Bill may be submitted to the JTM within three
         parliamentary working days.

1. Calling of Joint Sitting

The Speaker of the National Assembly, Ms B Mbete, and the Chairperson
of the National Council of Provinces, Mr M J Mahlangu, in terms of
Joint Rule 7(2), have called a joint sitting of the Houses of
Parliament for Friday, 27 June 2008 at 10:00 in order to celebrate the
90th birthday of Nelson Rholihlahla Mandela, former President of the
Republic.



B MBETE, MP                                    M J MAHLANGU, MP
SPEAKER OF THE                                 CHAIRPERSON OF THE
NATIONAL ASSEMBLY                        NATIONAL COUNCIL OF
                                    PROVINCES

National Council of Provinces

The Chairperson

1. Message from National Assembly to National Council of Provinces in respect of Bills passed by Assembly and transmitted to Council

(1)    Bills passed by National Assembly and transmitted for
     concurrence on 24 June 2008:


     (a)      Prevention of and Treatment for Substance Abuse Bill [B
         12B – 2008] (National Assembly – sec 76).


        The Bill has been referred to the Select Committee on Social
         Services of the National Council of Provinces.


     (b)      Financial Services Laws General Amendment Bill [B 21B -
         2008] (National Assembly – sec 75).


        The Bill has been referred to the Select Committee on Finance of
         the National Council of Provinces.


     (c)      Insurance Laws Amendment Bill [B 26B – 2008] (National
         Assembly – sec 75).


        The Bill has been referred to the Select Committee on Finance of
         the National Council of Provinces.


     (d)      Special Pensions Amendment Bill [B 29B – 2008] (National
         Assembly – sec 75).


        The Bill has been referred to the Select Committee on Finance of
         the National Council of Provinces.

TABLINGS

National Assembly and National Council of Provinces

    1. The Minister of Trade and Industry

   a) Government Notice No 180 published in Government Gazette No 30781
      dated 22 February 2008: Standards Matters in terms of the
      Standards Act, 1993 (Act No 29 of 1993).
   b) Government Notice No 181 published in Government Gazette No 30781
      dated 22 February 2008: Standards Matters in terms of the
      Standards Act, 1993 (Act No 29 of 1993).


   c) Government Notice No R.193 published in Government Gazette No
      30782 dated 22 February 2008: Review Board Regulations: Appeal
      fees, in terms of the National Building Regulations and Building
      Standards Act, 1977 (Act No 103 of 1977).


   d) Government Notice No 224 published in Government Gazette No 30805
      dated 29 February 2008: Amendment to the Compulsory Specification
      for vehicles of category 03 and 04, in terms of the Standards
      Act, 1993 (Act No 29 of 1993).


   e) Government Notice No 225 published in Government Gazette No 30805
      dated 29 February 2008: Proposed withdrawal of the Compulsory
      Specification for articles marked E.P.N.S. in terms of the
      Standards Act, 1993 (Act No 29 of 1993).

1. The Minister in The Presidency

     a) African Youth Charter, tabled in terms of section 231(2) of
        the Constitution, 1996.
   

COMMITTEE REPORTS

National Council of Provinces

1. Report of the Select Committee on Social Services on the Refugees Amendment Bill [B11B - 2008] (National Assembly – sec 75), dated 24 June 2008:

The Select Committee on Social Services having considered  the  subject
of the Refugees Amendment Bill [B11B – 2008] (National Assembly  –  sec
75), referred to it and classified by the Joint Tagging Mechanism as  a
section 75 Bill, reports the Bill with proposed amendments as follows:

                              CLAUSE 14

1. On page 8, in line 40, to omit “the” and to substitute “any”.

2. On page 8, in line 40, to omit “that processed his or her application”.

3. Report of the Select Committee on Finance on the oversight visit to Eastern Cape from 21 to 22 February 2008, dated 23 May 2008

Background

On 22 and 23 January 2008, the Select Committee on Finance held hearings with provincial departments on conditional grants capital expenditure for the first three quarters of the previous financial year. The Committee had concerns on a number of issues following the hearings and decided to have further meetings with the following departments:

1. Department of Housing, Local Government & Traditional Affairs
2. Department of Land Affairs
3. Department of Sport Recreation Arts and Culture
4. Department of Economic Development and Environment Affairs
5. Provincial Treasury
6. Land Claims Commission
7. Great Kei Municipality

Delegation

1. Hon E M Sogoni
2. Hon M O Robertson
3. Ms N C Chaso (Committee Secretary)
4. Ms N Mnyovu (Committee Assistant)
5. Ms M Herling (Researcher)

The meetings were held in the East London’s Regent Hotel.

Eastern Cape – Department of Local Government and Housing: Key Challenges

The Committee observed the following issues:

  • Poor planning by both the Department and  municipalities.  Some  of
    the approved projects were still not ready for implementation.
  • Some of the emerging contractors lack  capacity  and  there  was  a
    small pool of established contractors attracted to low cost housing
    resulting in the need to re-tender.  Established  contractors  were
    not attracted to  rural  development  projects  due  to  logistical
    issues  and  the  additional   cost   of   transporting   material.
    Established  contractors   were   supposed   to   mentor   emerging
    contractors.
  • The slow start of the  rectification  programme  was  a  cause  for
    concern. There was a lot of  unfinished  work  that  needed  to  be
    redone. There was also the issue of community housing that had been
    inherited  from  Matatiele,   KwaZulu-Natal   which   had   funding
    shortages. The rectification  programme  had  been  handed  to  the
    National Home Builders Registration Council (NHBRC), but  this  was
    progressing and only 5000 out of 19 800 units had been dealt with.
  • The land restitution process did not prevent  development  but  the
    department needed to consult with the Land Claims  Commissioner  to
    determine whether or not the development interfered with the claim.
    It was reported that problems arose in cases where the  development
    did not benefit the community as a whole.  Communication  with  the
    community prior to the development  was  critical.  Road  shows  to
    municipalities regarding this matter had been conducted but it  was
    reported that changes in the councils might have led  to  knowledge
    gaps.
  • There was a need to provide land for sustainable human livelihoods.


  • There was some misalignment of the Municipal Infrastructural  Grant
    (MIG)  and  the  housing  grant.  Reasons  for  this  included  the
    discrepancy in percentage growth in the allocation between  housing
    and MIG, the conditions of the grants  and  the  identification  of
    priorities by the province and the  subsequent  allocation  of  the
    grants by the Department of Provincial and Local Government.
  • The meeting was informed that one  could  still  find  cases  where
    houses  had  been  built  without  the  necessary  supporting  bulk
    infrastructure. There was a need  for  an  integrated  approach  to
    development.
  • The capacity of the provincial Department  of  Housing  remained  a
    challenge and slow moving projects  would  be  taken  back  by  the
    Department of Housing.
  • The department also reported that all contractors were meant to  be
    NHBRC approved and CIDB compliant but this was taking long owing to
    lack of capacity at the NHBRC.

Eastern Cape – Department of Sport, Recreation, Arts and Culture: Key Challenges

•  The  building  of  infrastructure  was  the  responsibility  of   the
  Department of Public Works.
• The process of registering quantity surveyors  took  time,  especially
  with respect to those  who  were  not  registered  with  the  Quantity
  Surveyors Board.
• There was a lack of commitment and capacity within institutions  which
  were expected to assist in service delivery.
• There was possible exemption in relation to the procurement of library
  materials  that  would  reduce  the  turnaround  time  for   receiving
  materials.
• There was a concern about the number of operational  libraries,  their
  location and also the question of who was  responsible  for  operating
  them. The province had 118 operating libraries and only  36  of  those
  received conditional grants.
• The Department reported that the main cause of poor  performance  were
  the capacity within the directorate and supply chain management.
• SEDA did not attend the meeting despite being invited.

Great Kei Municipality

  •  The  municipality  showed  improvement  in  relation  to   revenue
    collection.
  • Electricity distribution  was  confined  to  the  Komga  area.  The
    municipality had licences for areas  within  its  municipality  but
    there were still some problems with Eskom. There was a need  for  a
    smooth handover from Eskom to ensure that there were no disruptions
    in  service  delivery.  Eskom  received  R500  million   from   the
    Department of Minerals  and  Energy  to  re-establish  networks  in
    Komga.
  • Refuse removal was also a big  challenge  and  businesses  such  as
    holiday resorts were removing their own solid waste.
  • The condition of roads affected service delivery. There was a  need
    for capital equipment to improve and maintain roads.
  • The Development Bank of Southern Africa had committed R3 million to
    fund this municipality but the money had since been reduced  to  R1
    million.
  • Rural housing development was  engaging  Thubelisha  to  assist  in
    feasibility study and proposals that would be in line with  spatial
    development framework.
  • Water and sanitation were a big challenge  for  this  municipality.
    There was a need for assistance in relation to bulk water and water
    supply projects. There  was  almost  no  information  available  to
    determine expenditure and revenue for water services.  The  age  of
    water infrastructure reinforced the problem of water outages.
  • Questions were raised about the  municipality’s  ability  to  spend
    money. It was said that the municipality  would  get  support  from
    DBSA in the form of engineers, technicians & financial advisors.
  • The district reported that the local municipalities had no  records
    to verify their asset registers. The municipality  had  received  a
    disclaimer for the 2006/7 financial year. There was also no  proper
    planning for the refurbishment of infrastructure.
  • The Committee undertook to  have  further  discussions  with  Eskom
    regarding electricity distribution. Recommendation

There should be an ongoing forum where planning issues are discussed to ensure that stumbling blocks that have a huge impact on housing are identified and removed early. Each stakeholder should play its role effectively. All line managers in the forum must attend the meetings.

The Committee resolved that it would convene a meeting with Department of Water Affairs and Forestry to establish why the Great Kei Municipality has received only R1 million out of the R3,2 million provided by the Development Bank of Southern Africa.

Report to be considered

1. Report of the Select Committee on Finance on the oversight visit to identified provincial departments and the Sol Plaatjie Municipality, Northern Cape, dated 13 May

1) Introduction

The oversight visit took place on Friday, 28 March 2008. A meeting was held with the Sol Plaatjie Municipality and various governments departments. The Committee’s delegation was as follows:

     • Hon TS Ralane (Chairperson of the Committee)
     • Hon EM Sogoni (Gauteng, ANC)
     • Hon GM Goeieman (Northern Cape, ANC)
     • Hon BJ Mkhaliphi (Mpumalanga, ANC)

Staff composition was as follows: • Ms TP Xaso (Committee Secretary) • Ms NC Chaso (Committee Secretary) • Ms N Mnyovu (Committee Assistant)

2) Terms of reference

At a meeting held between the Committee and the Provincial Department of Local Government and Housing at Parliament, the Province indicated that it had been promised R100 million by National Treasury. The Department had indicated that it was in need of that funding and the Committee had undertaken to assist in attaining the money. The Committee’s objective in meeting with the Department of Local Government and Housing during this visit was to establish whether it had been able to absorb this additional funding and whether there were any risks of under-spending as a result of that additional funding.

The Committee had also been informed about challenges that related to building materials which had been bought three to four years ago by the Department of Local Government and Housing, but remained unused. Given that this matter impacted negatively on housing delivery in the Province, the Committee undertook to meet with the department concerned and the affected municipality of Sol Plaatjie.

The Provincial Department of Health had reported to the Committee that the Provincial Treasury had taken over the Health Department. The Committee had undertaken to follow the matter up in a meeting with both departments. This was one of the reasons for the meeting in Northern Cape.

The Departments of Agriculture and Roads, Transport and Public works were invited to report on their third quarter expenditure of Conditional Grants and Capital Expenditure as well as personnel and non-personnel spending.

National and provincial departments as well as other stakeholders that were invited to the meeting were as follows: • Department of Provincial and Local Government • National Treasury • Provincial Department of Roads, Transport and Public Works • Provincial Department of Health • Provincial Department of Agriculture • Provincial Treasury • The Homeless Federation • Provincial National Home Builders Registration C

The Provincial Department of Health was one of the main reasons for the Committee’s visit to the Northern Cape. The Committee expressed its displeasure at the non attendance of the MEC and the Head of Department at the meeting.

Both the provincial Treasury and the provincial Health departments reported that relations between the two had improved. The Committee, however, was not convinced that this was so. On two occasions the Northern Cape Department of Health had reported that they were not able to function as a result of the Provincial Treasury. The reports presented that relations were good were perceived to be making mockery of the Committee’s visit to the province. Poor relations between the two departments had led to hospitals not having medication. Furthermore, the Committee was concerned that the Health Department had not prepared a proper report to form a basis for the discussion, nor had it taken serious the matter on hand.

The Committee further informed the Department of Health that the Public Works Department reported that Health had not signed a Service Level Agreement. Moreover, the Committee still needed to enquire from the Treasuries what had brought about the need for the department to be under administrations.

Provincial Treasury reported that the decision to put Health under administration was made by the Provincial Executive Committee (EXCO). According to the Provincial Treasury, it was the media that reported about a hostile take over and this was said to be the reason for the misunderstanding between the two departments. It further disputed the statement of a hostile takeover.

There was a concern with relating to inconsistency on the part of the Provincial Treasury given that Public Works in the province had been and was still in a worse condition than the Health Department. The appointment of the Chartered Accountant was also a concern and questions were raised as to what the role of the CFO was in such an event.

Local Government and Housing

The department reported that the additional allocation of R100 million had been received and that the money had already been transferred to district municipalities for housing delivery. To this end no risks were anticipated. Those were the Pixley Kaseme, Kgalagadi, Francis Baard and Siyanda district municipalities. The department further reported that monitoring and evaluation plans were already in place to ensure that the money was used appropriately. The Committee expressed a concern that, as far as it was aware, the only municipality that had been targeted for accreditation as a housing developer was the Sol Plaatjie Municipality and none of those mentioned by the department. The Committee further enquired as to when these municipalities became accredited. According to the Committee no other district municipalities had been targeted for accreditation. Furthermore it noted that housing delivery was the competency of the department not district municipalities. The observation made by the Committee was that money had been dumped on the municipalities by the department. The Committee enquired as to whether there were any houses delivered in the process.

The department responded that there were projects, according to their business plan, that had been waiting for funding. This was the basis on which the additional allocation had been requested. It added that the districts were still in the process of accreditation and that the funds were transferred to municipalities that had made claims. According to the department the transfers were done two weeks prior to the meeting with the Committee. The Sol Plaatjie Municipality, however, disputed having received money from the department.

The Committee expressed a concern at the contradiction in the versions given by the department and the Sol Plaatjie Municipality and sought clarity on the nature of communication lines in regard to transfers of funds.

The Committee raised the matter regarding material that had been bought for the delivery of houses. A group of housing beneficiaries called the Homeless Federation had been present in a visit three years ago during a provincial week wherein decisions were taken with respect to the delivery of houses. Certain promises were made at the time to a parliamentary delegation but nothing had come of them.

The Committee was informed that the project had stopped pending an investigation that was underway with regards to materials that had been bought. It was reported that the Premier had instituted the investigation into the matter. The municipality reported that this was one of the projects that had been stifled by the department who went into agreements with contractors, bypassing the municipality and issuing subsidies.

It was not clear how exactly the department had come up with a list of beneficiaries given that the municipality had been excluded from all processes. It was noted that, under normal circumstances, the indigent list should be with the municipality. To this end the department responded that it had held several meetings with the municipality and other support organisations. The Sol Plaatjie municipality disputed this. It further reported that the current beneficiaries were not eligible to benefit from the project.

Recommendations of the Committee The Committee recommends as follows: 1. Projects should be in line with the Integrated Development Plans (IDP) and in consultation with the Sol Plaatjie Municipality. 2. The Northern Cape Premier should be asked for the report on the investigation she had instituted. 3. The Mayor of Sol Plaatjie and the Department of Local Government and Housing should assist by expediting availability of the report on the investigation to avoid further delays which were leading to escalated costs.

Roads and Public Works

The Committee noted with concern that there seemed to be a communication problem within the department. A question was posed on the status of a project that related to one mental hospital in the Province. A further question related to the provision of transport to other departments and whether this responsibility lay with the transport department or not. Furthermore the Committee enquired whether the department had any Service Level Agreements with suppliers. Spending as at 31 December was as 57% or over R2 million and now the expense was projected to be 100%. Capacity was another area of concern raised by the Committee.

In responding to these questions the department reported that in consultation with the Provincial Treasury, it had employed people, in terms of the IDP programme, who assist by looking into capacity issues and identifying the role of the department. With regards to the fleet management, it was reported that this service had been outsourced. At the time of the meeting the tendering process was underway.

The Committee was informed that Service Level Agreements (SLA) had been agreed to and the department was in the process of effecting them with the various departments it dealt with. It further reported that the Health department had not signed the SLA while other departments had signed.

The department acknowledged that its expenditure was at 57% by end December and maintained that at the time of the meeting it was at 100%. To justify this leap the department cited that from 14 December to 14 January contractor closed and that invoices were forwarded to the department in January and payments only started to take place then. They added that the maintenance of access roads was also a factor resulting in what appeared to be a March spike.

The department reported that they had approached treasury for money to build the SK road however treasury could not provide the funds. To this end the Committee felt that this was an indication that there had been no prior planning for the project, hence Treasury had no money for it.

A concern was raised with the Provincial Treasury in respect to its allocations towards roads infrastructure which amounted to a mere R199 million coming from the equitable share while the biggest allocation of R257 million came from conditional grants. The Committee noted that the bulk of that R199 million was probably spent on salaries.

Recommendations of the Committee

The Committee recommends as follows: • A list of all municipalities to which money had been transferred and where access roads had been constructed should be submitted to the Committee; • Furthermore there should be an indication of how these linked to the Municipal Infrastructure Grant and the Integrated Development Plans and • This information should be forwarded to the Committee within three weeks after the consideration of the report by the Council..

Department of Agriculture

The department had overspent on CASP and Land Care and it argued that this was not as a result of poor planning on its part. It added that bulk of its spending took place from January because there had been outstanding completion certificates that were required before money could be paid out. Furthermore it reported that the allocations of the conditional grants were based on each project determining how much money it required.

The Committee enquired on how the overspending would be funded and whether there were any programmes that had been compromised to fund the land care programme. The department responded that funding would come from the equitable share and a food security fund. Some of the money came from the hydroponics project in Moreletswa which was under-spending. To this end it was pointed out that the department was compromising issues of food security. The place where the hydroponics structure had been put up had no drainage and alternative location needed to be found. The location had been in an industrial area where there were no community members. It was noted that the project had not been compromised but merely relocated. There were interactions with the Droogfontein beneficiaries with the view to moving the project to their location.

The Sol Plaatjie Municipality reported that the report about the project was different from the information at its disposal. It added that it had not been consulted about the relocation of the said project. The department apologised for not involving the municipality in the project and undertook to improve on this front.

The Committee encouraged the two to finalise the matter and noted that the performance of the department would be closely monitored by the Committee. It was found to be an interesting coincidence that all invoices had come through at the same time. The Committee also pointed out that vandals would always be there hence the need to partner with communities and municipalities.

A question was posed to the Provincial Treasury as to how much would be allocated towards agriculture in the coming year for infrastructure, given that some of its projects were in crops and live stock. Provincial Treasury indicated that the department had been given R8.8 million for the 2008/9 financial year based on their business plan and on the basis of page 108 of the Division of Revenue Act.

Conclusion

Mr Goeieman and the department were tasked to visit some of the projects outlined by the department. It was indicated that in some cases, Mr Goeieman would need to conduct unannounced visits to ascertain whether the projects reported on did exist. His task would be to assess the impact of these projects on the communities within which they existed and the sustainability thereof.

Report to be considered.

1. Report of the Select Committee on Finance on the oversight visit to Limpopo, 22 February 2008, dated 23 May 2008

 1) Introduction

The Select Committee on Finance conducted an oversight visit to the province of Limpopo on Friday, 22 February 2008. The delegation was follows:

 • Hon T S Ralane (Chairperson of the Committee)
 • Hon D Botha (ANC MP)

Support staff: • Ms T Xaso (Committee Secretary) • Mr M Tau (Researcher) • Ms N Tshoma (Committee Assistant)

2) Background

From Tuesday, 22 January 2008 the Select Committee commenced with hearings wherein Provincial departments accounted for their expenditure of the 1st, 2nd and 3rd Quarter Conditional Grants, Capital Expenditure and Personnel & Non-personnel. It was evident from these hearings that the Committee needed to undertake a visit to the Province of Limpopo to follow up on matters that had been raised during the hearings. The Committee intended to meet with the following departments: a) Roads and transport b) Local Government and Housing c) Agriculture d) Health e) Sports, Arts and Culture f) Water Affairs and Forestry g) Provincial Treasury

The following National Departments and entities were invited to accompany the Committee on this visit: a) Department of Housing b) Department of Sports and Recreation, Arts and Culture c) Department of Provincial and Local Government (DPLG) d) Development Bank of South Africa (DBSA) e) Department of Water Affairs and Forestry (DWAF)

3) Terms of reference • The Committee wanted to follow up on a report by the Department of Agriculture that they were constructing roads in farm areas. Roads and Transport in the province had been invited so that they could respond to this matter; • The Department of Health had expressed concerns that it was under-funded; • The Committee also needed to interact further with the Department of Sports, Arts and Culture to discuss their under- spending in respect of the grant for libraries;

4) Findings

Having discussed at length matters of concern with departments which were in attendance, the Committee made the following observations:

Provincial Departments of Agriculture and Roads and Transport The Committee concluded that there was • Generally no collaboration amongst departments in the province; • no collaboration between the two departments; • a lack of cooperation on the part of Roads Agency Limpopo (RAL) with regard to business plans and reporting back; • evident non-participation by departments in IDP’s; • high salaries paid by Road Agency Limpopo (RAL) when compared to Roads and Transport; • staff component at RAL was 40 versus the department’s staff component of about 2000 despite the fact that RAL received 70% of the infrastructure budget. These issues had been raised by the Committee with the MEC for Roads and Transport, requesting the MEC to resolve issues of parity between the officials of the department and those of RAL; accountability and; • gaps were identified in terms of district roads in areas that had no powers to build road (e.g. Greater Skhukune).

The following were the recommendations of the Committee: • The Departments of Roads and Transport, Agriculture and the Provincial Department of Local Government and Housing were requested to convene an urgent meeting to look at the issue of infrastructure in the province, inclusive of district roads, in respect of areas relating to agriculture. Out of that meeting they should draft a proposal to the FFC, Provincial Treasury and the National Departments of Roads and Agriculture requesting more funding. IDP’s were to be an integral part of that proposal; • Mr Tooley, was tasked to coordinate this meeting and report back to the Committee within three weeks.

Department of Sports and Recreation, Arts and Culture

The Committee observed that there was: • disagreement between the Provincial Department and the Provincial Treasury in terms of figures on expenditure; National Department was, however, in agreement with the Provincial Department; • under-spending with respect to libraries and was of great concern; • a concern that transferred figures did not necessarily translate to expenditure; Whilst pointing out that reports at Treasury emanated from submissions by accounting officers, the Committee recommended the following: • Provincial Treasury and the Provincial Department of Sports, Arts and Culture meet to resolve differences in reported figures; • Report back to the Committee within two weeks after consideration of the report by Council; • The Committee committed itself to monitor this closely; • It was proposed that national projects should be done in consultation with the Provincial Treasury in order to provide a synergy and avoid disjuncture in reporting. • The Committee advised the Provincial Department to draft a report outlining how the adjustment budget of R16m was to be spent

National Department of Housing

The Provincial Department of Local Government failed to make input at the Committee’s proceedings due to their late arrival, after the meeting adjourned.

The Committee observed that provinces were still not capacitating municipalities to become housing developers. Provincial Treasury informed the Committee of challenges they experienced when meeting with the Provincial Department of Local Government and Housing, thereby requesting the intervention of the Committee.

The Committee reiterated to the meeting that housing was a provincial competence and that the provincial department had the responsibility to capacitate municipalities and avoid dumping money on them. It was noted that a major challenge was that of planning.

In the absence of the Provincial Department of Housing the Committee permitted the National Department to leave stating that discussions on housing would be taken further at hearings on the Division of Revenue Bill which were scheduled to follow shortly.

Development Bank of Southern Africa (DBSA)

The Committee was still waiting for a report from the DBSA and DPLG on what was being done to assist municipalities in need of assistance. The observation of the Committee was that assistance given to municipalities was in the context of Siyenza Manje, which did not speak to other programmes, which were also under the DBSA. The Committee resolved that this would be taken

Provincial Department of Health

While the department acknowledged that some of its challenges related amongst other things to issues of high procurement costs and abuse of the departments vehicles, it stressed that its biggest problem was the fact that it was extremely under funded. The department also expressed its difficulty in adhering to the PFMA given its circumstances within the province. At a recent hearing before the Select Committee on Finance the province had raised a concern at a baseline allocation of 24.1%. Furthermore the Committee was also informed that due to the gross under funding, the department would carry over into the new financial year debts of the last two months of the previous year. Some of the reasons given by the provincial department for over expenditure included costs for the transporting of bio-hazardous waste; importing of vaccines; warehousing of medicines and distribution thereof; personnel and other expenses, which include Occupation Specific Dispensation (OSD’s). The Committee resolved to verify the matter of OSD’s with the National Department of Health.

Having heard the report of the Department, the Committee made the following observations with respect to the Department of Health in Limpopo:

• For the Provincial Growth and Development Strategy of any province to work, it requires healthy people to partake in it; • Expenditure for OSD’s was very high; • There was a need to align provincial priorities with national priorities • The baseline had risen to 25.9%.

Recommendations

The Committee recommends that:

• the MEC’s for Treasury and for Health meet and discuss funds available through OSD’s. • HOD’s of these two departments also meet to discuss matters at an official level; • the National Department of Health conduct an audit to determine the rate at which professionals are leaving the province and come up with strategies for staff retention; • Portfolio Committees in the provincial legislatures should be part of interactions with provincial departments.

Report to be considered

1. Report of the Select Committee on Finance on the oversight visit to identified municipalities in Mpumalanga, dated 23 May 2008

1) Introduction

The oversight visit took place from 18 to 19 March 2008. Meetings were held at the Gert Sibande Municipality in Secunda. The delegation was as follows:

     • Hon TS Ralane (Chairperson of the Committee)
     • Hon EM Sogoni
     • Hon GM Goeieman
     • Hon DJ Botha
     • Hon ANT Mchunu
     • Hon MO Robertsen
     • Hon ZS Kolweni
     • Hon BJ Mkhaliphi

Staff composition was as follows: • Ms TP Xaso (Committee Secretary) • Ms NC Chaso (Committee Secretary) • Ms N Mnyovu (Committee Assistant)

2) Terms of reference

The visit formed part of the Committee’s ongoing interaction with municipalities to monitor collaboration and coordination pertaining to the provision of municipal services and support given to municipalities by provincial and national departments. The following municipalities had been identified for the visit: • Emakhazeni Local Municipality • Emalahleni Local Municipality • Steve Tshwete District Municipality • Gert Sibande District Municipality • Albert Luthuli Local Municipality • Msukaligwa Local Municipality • Bushbuckridge Municipality • Nkomazi Local Municipality

National departments and other stakeholders that accompanied the Committee on this visit were as follows: • Department of Provincial and Local Government • Department of Minerals and Energy • Department of Water Affairs and Forestry • National Treasury • Eskom

The aim of the Committee was to engage with the above mentioned municipalities, along with national and provincial departments, on the following areas:

• Municipalities’ budgets;
• Municipalities’ compliance with the Municipal Finance Management Act;
• The spending and performance of  the  municipalities  with  regard  to
  conditional grants;
• The municipalities’ relations and collaboration with various  national
  and provincial departments and entities;
• Capacity constraints of the municipalities, if any;
• The extent of service delivery; and
• Determining whether municipalities’ Integrated Development Plans  were
  aligned to the Provincial Growth and Development Strategy.

3) Findings

    a) Emakhazeni Municipality
  The municipality reported that it had been appointed as a housing
  developer and that progress had been made in delivering houses.  Only
  920 people were registered on the indigent list in the 2006/7
  financial year and this was a concern for the Committee which felt
  that the number should have been bigger than 920.


  It was reported that the municipality had a Mayor’s Discretionary Fund
  amounting to R5m.


  Sewerage and refuse removal were reported to be free for all  indigent
  people. One of the major challenges faced by the municipality was  the
  deaths of the indigent people as funerals  were  not  affordable.  The
  municipality further reported that it had come up with a  strategy  to
  deal with this. In addition, some managers had adopted needy families.




  Other challenges reported by the municipality were:
        • Transportation for learners who had to  travel  distances  of
          over 80km to get to school;
        • Provincial departments that owed money  to  the  municipality
          (Education, Health and Local Government  and  Housing),  some
          for over three years. To this end the  municipality  reported
          that a service provider had been appointed to deal  with  the
          collection of monies owed;
        • A promise not met by the DPLG of R65 million  relating  to  a
          pilot project of which the municipality was a part;
        •  Government  departments  that  refused  to  participate   in
          Integrated Development Plans (IDP’s); and
        • Sewerage spillages were reported as a problem.


  The Department of Provincial and Local Government (DPLG) reported that
  it was pleased with the expenditure patterns of the  municipality  and
  encouraged the municipality’s  commitments  to  progress.  It  further
  reported  that  within  the  current   MTEF,   allocations   to   poor
  municipalities in terms of the Municipal  Infrastructure  Grant  (MIG)
  had been reviewed. Whereas the applicable formula would have allocated
  about R3m to Emakhazeni, reviewed allocations saw  this  municipality,
  and others similar to it, receiving a minimum of R5 million.


  DPLG confirmed  that  Emakhazeni  was  part  of  a  pilot  project  on
  developing an Infrastructure Management Plan. This pilot involved  the
  development of a 10 to 20 year  plan  for  the  municipality.  It  was
  reported that banks had been included in the  pilot  to  look  at  the
  municipality and its capacity to raise revenue. The  report  from  the
  pilot would be used to come up with a  plan  for  the  whole  country.
  Furthermore, the DPLG disputed the claim by Emakhazeni that an  amount
  of R65m had been promised to the municipality.


  The Provincial Treasury reported  that,  while  the  municipality  was
  compliant with the Municipal Finance Management Act (MFMA),  it  still
  relied heavily on grants and subsidies and was not able to  raise  its
  own revenue.  The Provincial Treasury informed the Committee  that  it
  had written letters  to  municipalities  in  the  province  raising  a
  concern about departments who  owed  municipalities  huge  amounts  of
  money. In the letters it had requested municipalities to indicate  the
  exact amounts owed and the duration of the debts. It reported that, to
  date, no responses had been received from the municipalities.


  Observations of the Committee


  The Committee made the following observations relating to the
  Emakhazeni Municipality:


     • According to the Municipal Finance Management Act (MFMA),
       municipalities were only allowed to invest money that was not
       immediately needed. It was the view of the Committee that the
       Mayor’s Discretionary Fund was not in line with the law; and
     • The DBSA needed to be brought on board with the pilot project by
       the DPLG.

    b) Msukaligwa Local Municipality

    Having heard the presentation of the  municipality,  the  following
    observations were made by stakeholders present, and the Committee:
     •  The  DPLG  complained  that  this  was  the  most   frustrating
       municipality to deal with in terms of cooperation. Some  of  the
       most obvious challenges faced by  the  municipality  related  to
       procurement and the appointment of staff. Furthermore, the  DPLG
       reported that it had been receiving reports signed by the  Chief
       Financial  Officer  (CFO)   and   Municipal   Manager   on   the
       municipality’s expenditure and was surprised to hear that  money
       had in fact not been spent.
     • National Treasury pointed  out  that  the  presentation  by  the
       municipality did not give specifics e.g.  how  many  houses  had
       been electrified. It added that, post 2010, municipalities would
       be getting more money and needed to gear  themselves  for  that.
       National  Treasury  observed  that  municipalities  neither  had
       ability to spend nor did they have the ability to  collect  from
       debtors. It was reported that, for over  three  years,  National
       Treasury had  been  trying  to  get  the  municipality  to  hire
       interns. It was also reported  that  the  municipality  was  not
       using the  Finance  Management  Grant  (FMG)  which  was  at  0%
       expenditure.
     • Provincial Treasury  also  raised  a  concern  that  the  report
       presented to the Committee was glaringly different from the  one
       that had been presented by the municipality  to  the  Provincial
       Treasury.

    The Committee made the following observations with respect  to  the
    municipality:
     • The number of positions was 1330 of which 741 were vacant  while
       the salary bill was already at  40%.  This  meant  that  if  the
       vacancies were to be filled the salary bill would be bloated. To
       this end, the Committee requested the  municipality,  Provincial
       Treasury, National Treasury, DPLG and Local Government  to  look
       at the following matters:
          a)  Determine whether  the  given  1330  posts  was  the  real
             figure;
          b) The credibility of the budget that  was  presented  to  the
             Committee;
          c) The sustainability of  the  budget  were  the  post  to  be
             filled;
          d) Address the issue of under-collection;
          e) Look into the alignment of priorities to the budget; and
          f) Determine whether there was a discretionary fund or not.

     • The Committee was concerned about the attitude  of  the  Auditor
       General given that in the context of what was presented  to  the
       Committee, there had  been  no  forensic  investigation  of  the
       municipality. The Committee noted that it considered interacting
       with the  National  Auditor-General  on  this  matter  with  the
       objective to assist and ensure service delivery.


    c) Nkomazi Municipality


    It was reported that the  provincial  Health  Department  owed  the
    municipality an amount of R9 million.


    DPLG reported that it was  pleased  with  the  expenditure  of  the
    municipality which was at 76%. They added that they were  aware  of
    challenges faced by the municipality.


    National Treasury pointed out that the  presented  budget  did  not
    include the capital budget which was a concern.


    Provincial Treasury  reported  that  it  had  challenges  with  the
    municipality and assisted wherever they were needed.


    Eskom reported that it had projects totalling 1400 connections  and
    another 943 connections were scheduled to be done  by  the  end  of
    March.


    The Department of Water Affairs and Forestry (DWAF)  reported  that
    it had a very good working relationship with the municipality.
    Observations of the Committee


    The Committee pointed  out  that  the  MIG  had  been  under-spent.
    Furthermore, the Committee was concerned that the municipality  had
    appointed a deputy CFO (a new post) while there was funding  for  a
    properly qualified CFO.


    The water subsidy was also under-spending. To  this  end  DWAF  was
    requested to assist in dealing with capacity. It was noted that, in
    a rural municipality such as this one, every cent needed to be used
    and used well. The Department of Local Government and  Housing  was
    requested to be part of the discussions on capacity building.


    d) Steve Tshwete District Municipality


    It was reported that the  total  number  of  libraries  within  the
    municipal area was eight. Eventually the  municipality  planned  to
    have ten libraries with two in rural  villages.   The  municipality
    further reported that their operational budgets were ballooning  as
    a result of high levels of legislation  governing  operations.  All
    new legislation came with  staff  requirements  which  reduced  the
    capital budget that had been aimed at  service  delivery.   It  was
    further reported that the district had instructed that MIG funds be
    ring-fenced to deal with issues of water.


    The Committee heard that the municipality needed an amount  of  R18
    million to assist in the provision  of  toilets  in  the  place  of
    biological toilets that were currently in place.


    The Committee was informed that the Provincial Education department
    also owed this municipality about R900 000. Furthermore it was said
    that funding was given to schools on  the  basis  of  how  old  the
    schools were, as such schools in towns received bigger  allocations
    than those in RDP areas.


    The Provincial Health Department also owed  the  municipality  R5.5
    million.  The  Department  was  reported  to  be  taking  over  the
    provision of primary health care. The municipality reported that it
    was resisting this move by the Health department since it felt that
    it could provide this service.


    The Committee was also informed that 74% of  the  municipal  budget
    was from its own revenue in which case it  sometimes  had  to  take
    loans. In areas where revenue was generated,  refuse  removal  took
    place twice a week and in others once a week.


    Provision for the indigent:
    10 kl of water, 50kwh, free sanitation, free refuse  removal,  100%
    rebate on property tax. The municipality reported that 82.3% of its
    equitable share went towards the free basic services for indigent.


    Furthermore the municipality  reported  that  it  was  facilitating
    housing delivery even though it had not been  given  the  subsidies
    for this. The actual erection of the houses was said to be done  by
    the province. In addition the municipality  believed  that  housing
    delivery  could  be  accelerated  if  the  municipality  could   be
    accredited.


    All municipal programmes were reported to be fully aligned  to  the
    Provincial Growth and Development Strategies (PGDS).


    The DPLG reported that it was pleased with the expenditure  of  the
    municipality. National  Treasury  commended  the  municipality  for
    being able to raise its own revenue. It noted,  however,  that  the
    question of unfunded mandates needed to be addressed.


    Provincial Treasury reported that the  municipality  complied  with
    the MFMA and that it had an in-house financial system  that  worked
    well.  It  also  pointed  out,  that  the  municipality’s   capital
    expenditure was an area of concern since the municipality  was  not
    spending according to a set benchmark.  To this end the  Provincial
    Treasury  reported  that  it  had  sent  out  a  template   wherein
    municipalities could fill in their capital projects.


    With  respect  to  the  accreditation  of  the  municipality,   the
    Committee agreed that it would set up a meeting with  the  National
    Department of Housing, Provincial Treasury and  Provincial  Housing
    to address the matter.


    e) Albert Luthuli Municipality


    The National Treasury pointed out that the  report  that  had  been
    presented by the municipality to it was not the  same  as  the  one
    presented  to  the  Committee.  It  was  reported  that  when   the
    municipality adopted its budget there had been  a  deficit  of  R22
    million. It had debtors of over R86 million. The adjustment  budget
    that was being presented  at  the  meeting  was  not  credible.  It
    further reported that the municipality was overspending by over  R1
    million  in  January  2008  on  its  Capital  budget.  Furthermore,
    National Treasury enquired on what the director  in  the  Municipal
    Manager’s office did.


    The National Treasury also noted that  in  the  operations  budget,
    there was an allocated amount for “other” and this had  the  second
    highest amount of money.  It  enquired  as  to  what  this  “other”
    included. It  also  pointed  out  the  glaring  difference  in  the
    capacity requirements of this municipality and that of  Msukaligwa,
    adding that this municipality seemed to be doing well  without  the
    huge numbers of staff needed in Msukaligwa. The Provincial Treasury
    concurred with National Treasury  that  the  presentation  differed
    from what had been presented to the Provincial Treasury.  It  added
    that support  was  given  by  Provincial  Treasury  to  assist  the
    municipality.


    The Committee made the following observations:


    The municipality had received a qualified report from  the  Auditor
    General. The findings of the AG with respect  to  the  municipality
    included among others:
  • Incorrect accounting framework;
  • Non availability of a fixed asset register;
  • Overstatement by R499 788 due to calculation error;
     • Capital Development fund overstated by R4m  due  to  calculation
       error; and
  • Non availability of source documents.


    f) Bushbuckridge Municipality


    The Committee noted the report by this municipality  but  requested
    that, given that the Mayor  and  the  Municipal  Manager  were  not
    present, they would be invited to be part of the meeting on  5  May
    in Cape Town.


    g) Gert Sibande District Municipality


    The presented report did not relate the  challenges  faced  by  the
    municipality, but reported on behalf of other municipalities.  This
    made  it  difficult  for  the  Committee  to  interact   with   the
    presentation.


    The municipality reported that it had  been  under  the  impression
    that it needed to report on the entire district. To this end it was
    agreed that the municipality should also  prepare  itself  for  the
    meeting scheduled to take place in Cape Town.


    h) Emalahleni Local Municipality


    In the absence of the Executive Mayor and  the  Municipal  Manager,
    the Committee noted the report by this municipality  but  requested
    that they be part of the meeting on 5 May in Cape Town.

4) Conclusion

    Given the above findings, the Committee made the following    conclusions:
  • Issues of capacity were a common challenge among municipalities;
     • Departments were not honouring their commitments to
       municipalities in terms of debt;
  • There were departments who were reluctant to participate in IDP’s;
     • Municipalities had discretionary funds that were not in line
       with the MFMA;
  • Some municipalities had very high salary bills;

5) Recommendations

  Emakhazeni Municipality
  The Committee recommends as follows:
     • Departments owing money to this and other municipalities  should
       promptly meet their commitments or risk being  in  violation  of
       the law;
     • The Department of Education should meet  with  the  municipality
       and address the question of scholar transportation;
     • The matter of the municipality being housing developers would be
       taken up by the Committee with the department of housing;
     • The Department of  Water  Affairs  and  Forestry  (DWAF)  should
       develop a programme of action to assist  with  the  problems  of
       sewerage spillages in Emakhazeni and report to the Committee;
     • The municipality should continue to put in place ways of raising
       its own revenue; Furthermore it should limit personnel  spending
       to be no more than 30% of its budget;
     • The MEC for Finance and the Mayor of Emakhazeni  should  address
       the issue of outstanding debts as a matter of urgency  in  terms
       of the MFMA.

  Msukaligwa


     • The Committee recommends that the municipality prepare a  report
       on the true state of affairs for a meeting that would be held in
       Cape Town on 5 May 2008.


  Nkomazi
  The Committee recommends as follows:
     • The Provincial Treasury meet with the municipality  and  discuss
       possible  ways   of   ensuring   capacity   building   for   the
       municipality.
     • The DWAF assist in dealing with capacity  issues  ensuring  that
       the municipality was able to spend its water subsidy.
     • The Department of Local Government and Housing should be part of
       the discussions on capacity building.
     • The Mayor should inform the Provincial Treasury  whenever  there
       was money owed to it by the departments.


  Steve Tshwete
  The Committee recommends as follows:
     • The municipality should consider making use of its investment to
       address the issue  of  biological  toilets.  All  municipalities
       should invest money that was not  immediately  needed,  in  line
       with the MFMA.


  Albert Luthuli
  The Committee recommends as follows:
     • Given the report of the Auditor  General  on  the  municipality,
       National Treasury should  meet  with  this  municipality,  DWAF,
       DPLG, Provincial Department of Local Government and Housing  and
       Provincial Treasury, to deal with  all  matters  raised  in  the
       report so as to get the municipality on track. Some of the focal
       areas specified for that   meeting were:
     • Alignment of budgets and
     • Salary bill
           o  The  DWAF  and  the  municipality  needs  to  resolve  the
             following matters that had been raised by the  municipality
             as challenges; the upgrade and refurbishment of  water  and
             sewer treatment works and the huge backlogs in sanitation.

  Report to be considered.