Public Service Commission warns new ministers — ‘don’t fire DGs for political reasons’

8 Jul 2024

The Public Service Commission has warned new ministers against replacing their director-generals ‘willy nilly’ and advised them to work with them and assess them on their merits.

The Public Service Commission (PSC) has warned recently appointed ministers in the government of national unity (GNU) against firing director-generals (DGs) on the basis of their political preferences.

The warning comes a week after President Cyril Ramaphosa announced his 32-member executive which includes representatives from the ANC, DA, IFP, and PA, among other political parties, after no outright winner was declared following the 29 May elections.

On Monday, the commission addressed members of the media in Pretoria on the work done in implementing the mandate of overseeing the effectiveness and efficiency of the public service between 1 January and 31 March 2024. It was quizzed on the fate of DGs following the recent ministerial appointments.

The PSC’s Vusumuzi Mavuso said ministers could not come “willy nilly” and tell “DGs [they] must just pack and go because they don’t want them and all that. All directors general are appointed on a particular term, fixed term period. Usually it’s five years.”

During negotiations to form the GNU, DA Federal Chairperson Hellen Zille in a leaked letter demanded not only Cabinet positions, but for contracts of DGs reporting to DA ministers to be reviewed. She also called for a panel of DA ministers to select DGs in portfolios led by the party.

In a counter letter, Ramaphosa rejected the request and suggested that the party “seemed to want to set up a parallel government that would operate outside the framework and parameters of the Constitution-based method and protocols of running the government of the Republic of South Africa”.

Read more in Daily Maverick: DA to continue talks with ANC amid dispute over Cabinet posts

Mavuso echoed similar sentiments, saying things ought to be done by the book.

“Over and above, there ought to be an assessment to check the suitability or competency of those directors general or even other lower-ranking officials. Therefore, it is incumbent upon ministers to be able to strike a relationship with their respective directors general before they can even come to any conclusion to want to have their own,” Mavuso said.

Mavuso also weighed in on the much talked about professionalisation of the public service and the stability in the relationship between the accounting officer, the DG, who runs the department, and the politician, the minister.

“We believe that the public service has to be professionalised, and it’s a non-negotiable. All those who’ve been appointed do have a right to be in the positions in which they are in unless, of course, there are misdemeanours that are committed. Then, of course, the due process of law will have to unfold to make an outcome or determination as to what should happen with those,” he said.

DGs serve as the accounting officers and heads of departments responsible for ensuring policy is implemented. Their salaries range from R1.5-million to just over R2-million.

Another PSC commissioner, Anele Gxoyiya, said the GNU was an important milestone in the existence of the 7th Administration, and that public servants and other organs of the state must support the transition and ensure continuity of service delivery quality.

Unpaid invoices

Over the years, the PSC has reported on the government’s non-payment of invoices within 30 days, as prescribed by law, for work and services rendered for the national departments.

Late payment has had crippling effects on businesses, with some being forced to shut down operations while their owners are unable to make a living, and others landing in trouble with the South African Revenue Service (SARS).

By the end of the 2023/24 financial year, there were still 1,427 invoices over 30 days old that had not been paid, representing a regression of 278 invoices or 24% compared with the end of the 2022/23 financial year, when there were 1,149 invoices.

The biggest culprit for non-payment at the end of the financial year is the Department of Justice and Constitutional Development, which has 1,375 invoices amounting to more than R42-million. It is followed by the Department of Public Works and Infrastructure with 39 unpaid invoices to the tune of more than R10-million.

The PSC, however, said national departments recorded a 2% improvement throughout the year as 108,917 invoices were paid after 30 days in 2023/24 compared with 111,282 in 2022/23.

The most common reasons provided by departments for the late and/or non-payment of invoices vary from misfiled, misplaced or unrecorded invoices to internal control deficiencies.

“The National Treasury has since provided recommendations to assist departments in addressing the identified root causes for late and/or non-payment of invoices and to ensure improvement in compliance with the requirement to pay suppliers’ invoices within the prescribed period of 30 days,” said Gxoyiya.

He has since called on executive authorities to take action against accounting officers who deliberately fail to pay service providers on time while citing cash flow problems.

“Our view as the Public Service Commission is that it is misconduct for you as an accounting officer to go ahead and appoint someone to deliver a service when you know that the department has got cash flow problems. When time comes for people to be paid, then people are not paid. So our call is that … action should be taken against those accounting officers,” Gxoyisa said.

Managers’ qualifications

Another pressing issue that the PSC has had to contend with is the lack of adequate qualifications of public service senior managers.

In March this year, BusinessDay reported that at the end of 2023, the qualifications of 1,779 senior management service (SMS) staff in the government were not listed on the central system used for the administration of the public service payroll (Persal).

The PSC had initiated an investigation to establish the employment circumstances of senior managers without qualifications. Speaking about its findings, it was satisfied that most SMS members (more than 90%) have National Qualifications Framework (NQF) levels 7 and 8 qualifications as expected and many of the remaining few who do not possess NQF 7 qualifications were appointed prior to 2015.

“However, it is concerning that there are isolated instances in a few departments that have not fully complied…”

“Furthermore, the inquiry has revealed that many departments have not updated the qualifications of their SMS members on Persal, and there are instances of failure to verify qualifications,” the commission said.

The commission has also found that 96% of the 3,966 senior management service members from the 37 national departments that were required to respond to the PSC’s inquiry are qualified for the positions they occupy.

“Only 11 of 37 departments said 100% of their SMS members are qualified for their posts. There were only 176 SMS members (4% of 3,966) who did not meet the NQF qualifications requirements for the posts they occupied and 114 (2.9% of the 3,966) were appointed before the introduction of the 2015 Directive on minimum entry requirements.”

It said the Department of Public Service and Administration should regulate the capturing of qualifications on Persal within 12 months and SMS members who didn’t have the required qualifications should submit plans to address the gaps. DM

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Unpaid invoices

Managers’ qualifications