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3 August 2023
Kimberley

Programme Director
MEC for Youth, Women, Children, Persons with Disabilities, Communications and E-government, Ms Venus Blennies
Director General, Mr Justice Bekekbeke
Members of the media

Ladies and gentlemen

DEATH OF ILLEGAL MINERS

Allow me before I start with our official statement just to reflect on the death of illegal miners in the Namakwa District of the Province. We have noted with deep concern reports by SAPS into the death of thirteen males at the Tweepad Mining area near Kleinsee. Preliminary reports indicate that the deceased were trapped underground when the tunnels collapsed. We wish to extend our condolences to the families and friends of the deceased. We also wish to caution against illegal mining activities which are a serious challenge in our country and pose a big threat to the safety and security of the surrounding communities as well as to the illegal miners themselves. As Government, we will continue to work collaboratively with all stakeholders to address this challenge.

RELOCATION OF OFFICE OF THE PREMIER

The pedigree of the Sixth Administration to cut wastages and frills should by now be beyond question. Since we assumed office, we have committed to this agenda and despite Covid-19, the Provincial Administration is financially in a much better position for three consecutive financial years we closed the exchequer account with a positive bank balance of more than R200 million due to cuts in operational expenditures and there is also a significant improvement in audit outcomes of Departments; having completely migrated out of Disclaimers and Adverse findings. The move to the new office is in keeping with that commitment.

The Office of the Premier is currently in the process of relocating from the Transnet Building to the DSC Office Park located at 69 Memorial Road, Monument Heights. Of importance to note is that the Transnet Building was officially opened in 1964 and will soon be celebrating its 60th year in operation due to elements of nature and wear and tear the building requires intensive attention and renovation.

The OTP moved into the Transnet Office Building in 2008 and the contract expired in 2014; because of some disputes on the contractual terms a short-term nine months transitional contract was concluded between the Department of Roads and Public Works (acting on behalf of the Office of the Premier) and Transnet and that contract expired in May 2015. Since June 2015, the Office of the Premier has been occupying the Transnet building without any contract but continued to date with the payment of a rental amount of R1 082 702. 75. For every monthly rental paid, Transnet recorded a shortfall amount. This amount was due to annual escalation costs of 6.5% that Transnet billed us. Since 2015 the Office of the Premier refused to pay the 6.5% escalation costs which brought the current monthly rental at Transnet Building to R1 621 538. The refusal to pay the escalation costs was due to the failure by Transnet to do maintenance of the building, literally, the building was rapidly deteriorating.

In terms of the contractual arrangement, Transnet is responsible for the maintenance of the building but due to this failure, the Office of the Premier spent more than R4 million in maintaining the building.

Since 2008 we have paid a total of R132 million to Transnet and there is an amount of R64 million which Transnet recorded as arrears due to our refusal to pay the 6.5% annual escalations. This refusal was not driven by any form of malice but by the failures of Transnet to maintain the building. The failure to maintain the building exposed the Office of the Premier to quite several embarrassing moments as a result of the deterioration of office amenities.

These matters were consistently raised with Transnet Management since 2015. After not getting a positive response from Transnet they were elevated to both the Premier and the Minister. We can report that three meetings took place between the Premier and the former Minister of Transport, Mr. Fikile Mbalula,  to discuss amongst others the state of the building and the fast-escalating rental cost. The Premier appealed to the Minister for his intervention in an amicable resolution of the matter. There were no positive outcomes to these engagements. The issues raised with the Minister are the defects highlighted in the 2021 report of Consulting Engineers and Valuators (SAMEX Consulting) who were commissioned by the Department of Roads and Public Works to assess the state of the Transnet Building. Briefly, the report highlights the following key issues

• The asking price by Transnet was above the valuation of the building.
• The inspection of the building revealed many defects including amongst others defective amenities, lifts constantly being out of order, electricity problems and chief amongst all the mentioned defects is that the building was not fire compliant which is a huge risk to the safety of employees and a threat to the assets of Government housed in the building.
• The Transnet Building has since the initial interventions by the Office of the Premier in 2015 deteriorated to such an extent that it became not only impractical to continue occupying that space but also posed major health and occupational safety concerns. The constant failure of amenities, loss of electricity due to cable theft as well as the non-availability of backup electricity all impacted the optimal performance of staff.   Some of the other concerns and defects worth noting are the constant breakdown of the lifts, ablution facilities that are continuously out of order leading to serious health hazards, the parking that is not sufficient and safe for the employees as 90% of the staff used to park in the streets, air conditioners that are always malfunctioning and theft of air conditioners.

The report also highlights that should Provincial Government have acquired the building in 2021, it would have costed Government an additional Forty-Two Million Rand to ensure that it is compliant with building and safety standards.

As a result of complaints by the employees in the Office of the Premier, the Department of Labour conducted an assessment in 2020 of the health and safety conditions of the Transnet Building. The report highlighted that the building was non-compliant with quite many health and safety requirements due to poor maintenance. Some of the issues are the non-functioning of the security system, the ablution facilities, elevators, and the fire detection system.

Because of all these challenges, in 2021, the Premier requested the Minister of Transport and Transnet Management to donate the building in its defective state to the Provincial Government and would then justifiably spend the Forty-Two Million on repairs and renovations to make the building compliant with health and safety standards and regulations.

This request was rejected and instead, Transnet made a counter-proposal for the purchase of the building for Sixty Eight Million Rand. Added to this, were the estimated repair costs of Forty-Two million Rand (R 42m), and on top of that an amount of Sixty Four Million Rand Transnet claimed as arrears on rental and utilities. All-inclusive, the cost of bringing the building to an acceptable health and safety condition through ownership by the Provincial Government would have cost Hundred and Seventy-Four Million (purchase price, arrears, and maintenance). This is an amount that the Provincial Government does not have. It is important to note that we are still making that call to Transnet to donate the building to the Provincial Government for us to renovate it and use it to address our unending requirements for office space.

We firmly believe that this relocation enables us to resolve the stalemate between the Provincial Government and Transnet and also provides a safe and conducive work environment for our employees in the most cost-effective manner. The expected monthly rental at Transnet Building for 2023 is R1 621 539.00 as opposed to the current rental of R1 384 614. 00. The Transnet amount excludes rates and taxes. At the Transnet Building, the Provincial Government was responsible for rates and taxes, which averaged about R135 000 per month, and this took the monthly rental to R1 734 956.00. At the new DSC Building, the owner is responsible for rates and taxes. So moving to the new offices will save the Provincial Government about R350 000 per month.

We wish to express our gratitude to the team at the Department of Roads and Public Works for the manner in which they handled the matter by securing much lesser rates per square meter than the previous occupants.

We want to put it on record that there were no direct engagements between the owner of the DSC Office Park and the Office of the Premier for the lease of the new building. As per the report received from the Department of Roads and Public Works, the Department identified a total of three properties from the register of landlords that could accommodate the staff of the Office of the Premier. Upon inspection, it was discovered that only the DSC Office block was the most suitable, safe, and affordable accommodation. After all legal prescripts were followed, approval was granted to the Office of the Premier to occupy the new premises. 

Relocating to the new offices is by no means a deviation from the mandate by the Office of the Premier of serving and improving the lives of the people of this Province. I and the entire staff remain committed to the vision that has been set for this Province and to continue to serve the people of the Northern Cape. The OTP welcomes all members of the public and interested parties to visit us at our new office space, which is situated at 69 Memorial Road, DSC Office Block, Monument Heights, Kimberley.

Released by the Office of the Premier

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Members of the Executive Council
Members of the Media
Ladies and Gentlemen

Background

As you are aware by now, the Department of Health, for the past two months has seen and experienced the most devastating protest action in recent times. This state of affairs is most unfortunate and regrettable and as we stated on numerous times we condemn these acts of violence and intimidation in the strongest of terms. We have also on several occasions stated that we acknowledge the right of labour to demonstrate and raise matters of concern to them. However these must be done in a safe, responsible and appropriate manner.

What we have seen - the reckless and dangerous manner in which grievances was and continue to be raised, has now escalated into violence, damage to property and reckless endangerment. This we cannot, and will not tolerate. All acts of criminality and intimidation will be dealt with accordingly. This is in no way a means to scare employees participating in these acts, but we as government, employees and civil society, have a responsibility to uphold the law and order and also to respect the rights of every citizen in this country.

I have said it before and I wish to reiterate, that the problems and issues raised cannot be solved overnight. We are committed to deal with all the issues and to do justice to the process; we need time to deal with the issues in a systematic and thorough manner. To resort to guerrilla tactics when things do not favour you is not creating an environment conducive for negotiation. If we share the same goals and if we are genuine in our collective concern for the wellbeing of the institution and the people we serve, we need to work together and in a spirit of cooperation and trust.

The situation at Health has a long history and I want to start off by giving you a brief background. The former MEC for Health, Mr Mac Jack had concerns, very serious concerns relating to maladministration, fraud and corruption at the Department of Health. This prompted him to establish an internal task team in 2015 to investigate these irregularities. The terms of reference of the task team were clear and the scope of their investigation was to investigate and report on their findings.

Reports and allegations of fraud and corruption were made by trade unions, employees, service providers and the general public. The seriousness to which MEC Jack viewed these allegations was demonstrated when he called in the Hawks to a meeting and agreed to ground rules for a collaborative approach. The process was kick-started with interviews with staff and company representatives. Written submissions were received from potential witnesses and a review of finance and supply chain documentation.

The team also reviewed all service providers through CIPRO to identify fraudulent and ghost companies. Site inspections were carried out to review progress on capital projects and the procurement of equipment. A summary of the findings were submitted to the Executive and handed over to Labour Relations for further action.

The Province collaborated with National Department of Health and forensic investigators and labour relations experts were deployed to assist with the investigations. Over a six month period the task team spent a number of hours on interviews, analysing evidence, researching information and travelling to health care facilities. A large amount of submissions, transactions, witness statements and invoices were analysed and similarly a large number of interviews were conducted.

Findings

Allegations have been made by the unions previously that officials are on suspension for months now without any action being taken against them and therefore they require these members to return to work. The opposite is however true.  I will now give you a brief run-down of the findings of the task team. Please bear in mind that these are the findings presented by the task team and covers only the scope of their mandate.

The team uncovered a web of fraud and corruption, including intentional and systematic flaunting of supply chain and procurement processes and prescripts.

Employees and service providers submitted testimonies of rampant kickbacks demanded by senior and junior personnel. The level of alleged fraud uncovered is estimated at a staggering Four Hundred Million Rand. More shocking is the announcement at a meeting last month with the Hawks and `National Treasury that the values in question were confirmed to be in excess of Five Hundred Million Rand.

Further findings of the team include and are not confined to amongst others:

• Falsification of documents
• Price fixing through collusive corruption.
• Quotation forgery, VAT and income tax fraud.
• Circumvention of Open Bid and Tender Processes. In many instances the contract value was just under Five Hundred Thousand Rand to avoid going on tender.
• Overriding Internal Controls.
• Exploitation of the Sundry Payment System.
• Extreme flouting of SCM Processes.
• Fruitless and wasteful expenditure.
• Unauthorized and/or irregular expenditure, and
• Conflicts of interest and non-declaration thereof.

Upon release of the findings the Head of Department was requested to issue precautionary suspensions to a number of staff implicated in alleged wrongdoing. These included:

• Three Chief Directors
• Two District Managers
• Two deputy Directors
• One Assistant Director
• Four Senior Administrative Officers, and
• One Administrative Officer.

Precautionary transfers of a Senior Administrative Officer, an Administrative Officer and a Clerk were also affected.

To demonstrate the seriousness with which the matter is being treated the following outcomes were affected after subjecting fingered employees to disciplinary processes:

• Human Resource Development Assistant Director was found guilty and dismissed.
• Deputy Director Finance: Guilty on 96 charges. Dismissed.
• One Chief Director found guilty on 26 charges and awaiting sanction. Another Chief Director who was on contract was relieved of his duties and the contract was terminated. A third Chief Director’s hearing was delayed due to a failed challenge of suspension and challenge with the appointed Chairperson of the Hearing. The matter is with the Labour Court.
• One District Manager has been found not guilty but found to be negligent in performing duties and is back at work. The matter has however been referred for external investigation. Another District Manager’ hearing is currently underway.
• A Senior Administrative Officer found guilty and we are awaiting sanction.
• All other matters not dealt with yet will be concluded once all processes have been finalised.

Intervention team

In June this year I deployed a group of officials to serve as an intervention team that would stabilise the Department and set it on course to function as an effective institution geared towards providing quality health services. This team has been met with challenges and resistance from the union formations.  In their short stay at the Department this intervention team has managed to a great degree to ensure efficiencies of resources and regularise especially the procurement processes and are looking at ways to reduce the contractual obligations in order to make for more cost saving expenditure. The current impasse however has warranted us to review the process and to this end we have resolved the following:

1. The intervention team was deployed to the Department of health with the specific and direct mandate as to their scope of work and will thus continue with their work.
2. As alluded, the verdicts and outcomes of some of the cases have been decided and officials that have been found not guilty have been advised to return to work. Other cases of officials still on suspension are in the process of being finalised.
3. The findings of the task team are compelling me as the Premier to instruct the Provincial Treasury to institute a section 18 intervention of the Public Finance Management Act (PFMA). A Section 18 intervention of the PFMA requires the Provincial Treasury to exercise control over the implementation of provincial budgets and to assist departments in building their capacity for efficient, effective and transparent financial management.
4. Lastly, in consultation and in agreement with the current Head of Department, we have decided that we will redeploy her elsewhere in the administration and appoint a caretaker Head of Department that will work with the entire management team as well as a turnaround team until we are satisfied that the Department of Health is functioning the way it should.

We have made that concession and it’s a demonstration of our willingness to negotiate in good faith. This however is no reflection on the capabilities, character and leadership of the HOD. Like any responsible official and true leader, the HOD requested to be released in order for the work to continue and so ensure that we serve those we are constitutionally and morally obligated to serve. I wish to offer my thanks and gratitude to Ms. Botes for the work done in her very short stay at Health.

I want to conclude by stating that resolving the issues at the Department will depend on all stakeholders. Both the Department and the labour formations need to recommit themselves to mend relationships and work together for the greater good. We call on NEHAWU to act with restraint and with respect for the rights of their colleagues and those they serve. This Government remains focused on delivering on the mandate of health services and a normalised situation is needed now to ensure that all centres of health can be conducive for the provision of health services.

Thank you

Released jointly by the Northern Cape Provincial Government

 

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The Northern Cape Provincial Government led by the Premier, Dr Zamani Saul, today had a follow up meeting with community representatives known as the People’s Forum. This follows a request by these community representatives to engage the Premier and the Sol Plaatje Municipality on their plans in assisting the municipality with the service delivery challenges and the intervention announced by the Provincial Government. Joining the Premier in the meeting were the MEC’s for the Department of Roads and Public Works, Transport, Safety and Liaison and Health, the Director General and senior government officials. Accompanying the Mayor were members from the Mayoral Committee and Executive Managers from the Sol Plaatje Municipality.

The aim of the meeting was to present the plans of the Implementation Task Team, which is a joint plan between the Provincial Government and the Sol Plaatje Municipality to address the short term challenges and work towards long term solutions to speed up service delivery in this municipal jurisdiction.

This office also notes with disappointment the many negative comments; in some cases from clandestine accounts, on social media. Premier wishes to make it pertinently clear that he has always promoted and encouraged dialogue with any person or organisation with a genuine and vested interest in building a modern, growing and successful province and city.

As Provincial Government we welcome the request made by these community members to form part of the intervention as well as their upfront declaration that they do not see any progress in destruction and vandalizing of property as a means to make their voices heard. Community members were allowed an opportunity to present their unique concerns as per their areas. The Premier calls on community members who are of the view that they are acting in the interest of the community to join the forum so that we can jointly ensure that we restore the dignity of the city and ensure that all our citizens have access to quality basic services.

In order to ensure that the process is as transparent as possible, a community Steering Committee has been established that will receive weekly reports on progress made on the intervention programme and the plans for the week that follows. Dr Saul reiterated Government’s commitment to see the successful rollout of the programme and called on the Municipality to be responsive and understanding to the calls of the community. Government will continue to work with anyone that has the genuine concern of communities at heart and wishes to see a difference in the areas where they reside.

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Issued by the Office of the Premier
4 May 2021