Department of Correctional Services 2018/19 Annual Report, with Deputy Minister

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Justice and Correctional Services

22 October 2019
Chairperson: Adv H Mohamed (ANC) (Acting)
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Meeting Summary

Annual Reports 2018/2019  

The Department of Correctional Services briefed the Portfolio Committee on its 2018/19 Annual Report. The Deputy Minister of Correctional Services accompanied the Department and offered apologies for the Minister who was with the Department of Justice that day.

The Department informed the Committee that the total inmate population in 2018/19 was 162 875, down from 164 129 in 2017/18. In 2018/19, there had been 54 935 parolees, 15 251 probationers and 1 387 awaiting trial persons. There had been 58 unnatural deaths and 56 escapes in the year under review. 118 officials had been dismissed for serious misconduct. Overcrowding, staff shortages and aging infrastructure were significant contributing factors to security incidents at correctional facilities but the intensification of management supervision had led to a decrease in the number of reported cases of assault of inmates. 24 attempted escapes had been foiled and 164 attempted suicides were prevented during the 2018/19 financial year.

The Department had a post establishment of 41 463 as at March 2019 with 3 119 vacant positions as a result of the ceiling on compensation of employees budget imposed by National Treasury. Seven of the Department’s 38 targets had not been met, including the completion of the Integrated Inmate Management System, the number of new bed spaces created and the number of parolees and probationers reintegrated into communities through halfway houses. Work on the Integrated Inmate Management System would continue as the service provider had not met its targets. The system was expected to be operational by 2020.

The Department of Correctional Services had received a qualified audit for the fourth time in five years but the number of findings had steadily decreased from 588 findings in 2014/15 to 204 findings in 2018/19. Many of the 2018/19 findings related to commitments and irregular expenditure. Three large contracts had accounted for the bulk of the irregular expenditure. The Department had a total budget R23.85 billion and an underspend of R72 million. The main causes of the negative findings related to the supply chain management that had been faced with changing prescripts and complex accounting standards in addition to the challenge of vacancies due to budget cuts. There had been a lack of capacity within the Supply Chain Management Division and the Finance Division. The high dependency on manual processes to generate information and reports had resulted in a high error rate. Non-financial managers had had difficulties with the Modified Cash Standards of Reporting. However, the Department had developed a comprehensive Audit Outcomes Turnaround Plan.

Members had many questions for the Department. They asked about the numerous cases of misconduct, the outcomes of the disciplinary hearings and the sanctions imposed. Why had there been an increase to 56 escapes? How many had been re-arrested? What crimes had they been in for? What had been done to address the particular issue? Were any charges instituted against members of the Department, and, if so, what were the outcomes and sanction?

Members were concerned about a number of financial transactions. Why was R76.9 million was written off as “other material losses”? What did that mean? R68.23 million was written off as loss on the Integrated Justice System. What did that mean? Regarding the Integrated Inmate Management System, had the contractor been paid the full amount? Were the strategies for improvement and addressing audit outcomes just talk shops and nothing happened, or did implementation happen but it fell short? There was an adversarial relationship between JICS and DCS, like IPID and SAPS. How could the relationship be fixed and why did DCS not do things requested by JICS?

Members were concerned about the overcrowding rate in all provinces. Why had the targeted number of bed spaces not been reached? What was the percentage overcrowding in C-Max? Could DCS explain the complete failure in that area? What processes or procedures were in place for establishing halfway houses? Where were the halfway houses situated? There were so many cases of misconduct but only 118 dismissals. What was happening in the Department? When was the Department going to reach the 50% target for women in management? What about the staff with a disability? Was hairdressing the only training for women whereas there were lists of programmes for men? Of the 77% Matric pass rate, how many were women?

Members noted that the parole boards at different prisons were in the media. Why did the parole boards not operate uniformly? When would the Department provide the Committee with the information that it needed about the challenges experienced with the way that the parole boards were run? Why did the Department never engage in public participation and never educate the community on parole boards? What had been done to implement the Phaahla judgement?
Election of Acting Chairperson
The Committee Secretary, Mr Vhonani Ramaano, opened the meeting and welcomed the Members.

He presented apologies from the Chairperson, who was, unfortunately, engaged in a meeting on Chapter Nine Institutions. The Secretary called for nominations, explaining that if more than one person was nominated, he would call for a vote. Adv H Mohammed (ANC) was nominated unopposed.

Opening remarks
The Acting Chairperson thanked Members for their confidence in him and reminded them that the Chairperson had tendered an apology. He also noted an apology from the Minister of Justice and Correctional Services, Mr Ronald Lamola, who was attending a strategic planning session of the Department of Justice and Constitutional Development. He noted that the Deputy Minister, Nkosi Phathekile Holomisa, would be arriving shortly. He welcomed the delegation from the Department of Correctional Services (DCS), especially the National Commissioner who would present the 2018/19 Annual Report and the successes, challenges and more particularly the goals of 2018/19. He was looking forward to the report.

Briefing by the Department of Correctional Services (DCS)
Mr Arthur Fraser, National Commissioner, DCS, stated that the Deputy Minister had intended to present the introduction but he would be joining the meeting soon, having been held up by air traffic.

The Commissioner said that in the year under review the organisation had achieved 82% of all targets set. DCS had achieved 100% of the Rehabilitation and Care targets which were at the centre of the rehabilitation and care process. The skills development programmes were critical. DCS had put in place certain interventions, such as a single operational centre and reviewing the current structures.

The Chairperson welcomed the Deputy Minister, Nkosi Holomisa.

The Deputy Minister thanked the Committee for the opportunity to present the Annual Report for 2018/19. On a number of areas, targets had been achieved but in others, the Department had fallen short and needed to pay better attention to areas highlighted by the Auditor-General (AG).

The Deputy Minister was pleased that DCS had opened a new high school named Tari Liswa (New Leaf) for Grade 10 to 12 learners. The Cradock Correctional Centre School had been opened. The Department wanted all young inmates to complete a Senior Certificate or at least complete Grade 9 or Adult Basic Education and Training Level 4.

Aimed at maintaining the wellbeing of inmates in its custody, the Department had provided a comprehensive package of healthcare services and programmes to inmates which included primary health care, nutrition, hygiene and pharmaceutical services. Approximately 99% of those tested positive for HIV had been put on medication.
                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                       
The Deputy Minister added that the Department would prioritise its ongoing engagement with the community in the current year and pay attention to irregular and fruitless and wasteful expenditure. In conclusion, he                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                        thanked Members of the Committee for their continued support and guidance.

The Acting Chairperson thanked the Deputy Minister and asked the National Commissioner to present the report on the R23.8 billion budget of DCS.

DCS Annual Report 2018/19
The National Commissioner handed over to the, Chief Deputy Commissioner for Strategic Management, Mr Joseph Katenga, to present the Annual Report for 2018/19.

Safety and Security at correctional facilities
Mr Katenga informed the Committee that overcrowding, staff shortages and aging infrastructure were significant contributing factors to security incidents at correctional facilities but the intensification of management supervision had led to a decrease in the number of reported cases of assault of inmates. 24 attempted escapes had been foiled and 164 attempted suicides were prevented during the 2018/19 financial year. The total inmate population in 2018/19 was 162 875, down from 164 129 in 2017/18. In 2018/19, there had been 54 935 parolees, 15 251 probationers and 1 387 awaiting trial persons.

The Department had a post establishment of 41 463 as at March 2019 with 3 119 vacant positions as a result of the ceiling on compensation of employees (CoE) budget imposed by National Treasury. Of the 38 annual targets, 31 had been achieved. Administration and Incarceration targets had not been reached and one social integration target had not been reached. The targets not achieved included:
- completion of the Integrated Inmate Management System (IIMS)
- an audit without qualifications
- the number of unnatural deaths
- the number of new bed spaces created
- the number of parolees and probationers reintegrated into communities through halfway houses.

The Acting Chairperson asked DCS to focus on the challenges and to explain why indicators had not been met.

Mr Q Dyantyi (ANC) indicated that Members had read the report and would rather spend more time engaging with the Department.

Ms Nthabiseng Mosupye, Government Information Technical Officer, DCS, explained that the IIMS for core business processes had been delayed because officials found use of the system overwhelming and the facial recognition and fingerprints capability could not be completed on time. The Department was being assisted by a service provider whose contract had been extended by one year. The DCS staff were being trained to manage and enhance the system in the future and there were no additional costs to the Department for the extension of the contract.

Dr Riaan Botha, Acting Deputy Commissioner: Facilities, explained that the intention had been to create additional bed spaces through new construction of correctional centres and upgrade projects:
-C-Max project for 12 beds had been completed in 2018.
-Escort facility was completed after the end of the financial year in May 2019.
-Standerton facility was also finalised in the new financial year, i.e. in May 2019.
-New facilities in Tzaneen targeted for 2018/19 had not been completed. It was currently 99% complete after the contractor had been liquidated and the new contractor promised completion in November 2019.

Dr Botha explained that, in the past, DCS could not update the bed space figures which were moving targets as cells became dilapidated or were re-commissioned because the Department had used a paper system to update the figures. However, DCS was now auditing all bed spaces, re-measuring all cells and calculating actual bed spaces. 220 out of 243 institutions had been completed and captured on the IT system.

The Acting Chairperson asked if penalties had applied when contracts were changed and whether the deviations were authorised.

Mr Dyantyi asked that the Acting Chairperson hold back on the questions and the detail and allow DCS to run through the presentation.

The Acting Chairperson said that he had asked DCS only to zoom into targets not achieved.

Ms N Maseko-Jele (ANC) suggested that the DCS should proceed and complete the presentation.

Fraud and corruption
Mr Katenga informed the Committee that 218 incidents had been reported; a total of 609 cases and 342 enquiries had been brought forward from previous years. 1 777 investigations had been finalised, in 34 cases prima facie evidence of misconduct had been found and disciplinary proceedings were initiated. 32 disciplinary hearings had found 31 officials guilty.

Financial matters
Mr Nick Ligege,CFO, DCS, stated that DCS had received a qualified audit but the number of findings had steadily decreased from 588 findings in 2014/15 to 204 findings in 2018/19. Many of the 2018/19 findings related to commitments and irregular expenditure. DCS had a total budget R23.85 billion and an underspend of R72 million.

There had been an issue with AGSA as the auditors had wanted reports on the work done by the Department of Public Works but that would have created a system of double reporting. The AG’s position had been modified.

Causes of Negative Audit Outcomes
The supply chain management (SCM) had been faced with changing prescripts and complex accounting standards in addition to the challenge of vacancies due to budget cuts. There had been a lack of capacity within SCM and the Finance Unit. The high dependency on manual processes to generate information and reports had resulted in a high error rate. DCS had also encountered the problem of a lack of understanding of Modified Cash Standards (MCS) of Reporting by non-financial managers and that had resulted in incomplete, inaccurate reporting and non-compliance with MCS. There had been constant changes and an unclear supply management regulatory environment with many directives from National Treasury.

Measures taken to address audit outcomes
The Department had developed an Audit Outcomes Turnaround Plan that required: training and capacitation of SCM and Financial Management components, automation of processes for performance information, SCM and Finance, and a review of Governance structures and policies.

DCS would conduct internal control workshops and indabas to enhance understanding of regulatory environment and improve internal control maturity, maintain audit files for all work done to improve controls.
Measures would be undertaken to address audit outcomes including the finalisation of the investigations of irregular, fruitless and wasteful expenditure. The Department would also review the entire population of commitments and irregular expenditure to ensure complete and accurate disclosures.

Discussion
Adv G Breytenbach (DA) noted that the most common type of misconduct was absenteeism or repeated absenteeism from work without a valid reason or permission with 1 271 cases; dereliction of duties with 586 cases and breaching of security measures with 329 cases. What had been the outcome of the disciplinary hearings? What was a typical sanction? Four people had been given a final written warning for corruption. What sort of corruption had it been and was that a typical sanction?

Adv Breytenbach noted that the shortage of bed space was currently at 37% and yet not one bed space had been created in the year. Zero out of a target of 435. Twelves bed spaces were created at C-Max during upgrades but could not be verified by the AG. What was the percentage overcrowding in C-Max? Could DCS explain the complete failure in that area?

Adv Breytenbach asked about the 58 unnatural deaths in 2018/19. It was way too many. What were the causes? The Judicial Inspectorate for Correctional Services (JICS) suggested that the figure was 103 unnatural deaths. Could DCS explain the discrepancy? Why had there been an increase to 56 escapes? Why had there been an increase? How many had been re-arrested? What crimes had they been in for? What had been done to address the particular issue? Were any charges instituted against staff members, and, if so, what were the outcomes and sanction? Regarding inmates with mental illnesses, what was the plan to deal with that? What was being done to assist those inmates? 100% of the budget for that area had been spent but only 66% of the target had been reached. Could DCS explain the discrepancy?

Regarding various sums written off, Adv Breytenbach asked if DCS could explain why R76.9 million was written off as other material losses. What did that mean? R68.23 million was written off as loss on Integrated Justice System. Could DCS explain what that meant? The AG had expressed concern about a lack of consequence management. How would that be dealt with? The entertainment budget had tripled. What entertainment did the budget pay for? Rehabilitation, including salary, was at 7% of the annual budget. That made a mockery of the rehabilitation as a strategic goal and meant that DCS was just providing a very expensive warehousing service. How did the Department intend to deal with that matter? It was an ongoing issue and raised every year.

Adv Breytenbach noted that responses from the previous meeting had not been submitted. When could the Committee look forward to receiving those responses? DCS had agreed to supply information regarding the implementation of the Phaahla judgement. Could DCS provide the Committee with the information as Members were unable to respond to queries in that regard. DCS spoke of danger zones where it was not able to monitor parolees. The Committee had not received the update. What was the current position?
She had directed an enquiry regarding a proposed parole to a Mr Smalberger whose immediate response had been that he had forwarded the question to the Division dealing with Incarceration and stated that the Acting DCS head of Incarceration would handle it. That was in early September. She had received no response or acknowledgement from that Division despite the email being sent to several officials. Why? If she was having that much difficulty in getting a response, how difficult was it for anyone else?

Mr W Horn (DA) said, bearing in mind that the National Commissioner had taken office just after the beginning of the financial year under discussion and he had assured the then Committee that he had already been appraised of all the challenges, both the audit outcome and the performance report was very worrying. He noted the CFO’s comment that the number of findings had come down but the AG had told the Committee that there had been a regression in terms of financial and other reporting. He asked the National Commissioner about the system of colours of green, yellow and red. The AG had said that there was a regression in terms of assurances on the part of the Executive Authority. That meant that the National Commissioner had not been available when they had wanted to raise issues with him and when they did meet with him, there had been a non-committal approach regarding issues that had to be addressed immediately or it would affect the audit outcomes. The rest was history. What was the National Commissioner going to do about it and what should the Committee conclude regarding that issue?

Mr Horn said that the National Commissioner, in his address to the Committee, had talked about a review of corporate governance structures. What was the outcome of the review? The AG also pointed out that there had been five acting Chief Deputy Commissioners (CDCs) during the year. That created instability as acting people did not take tough decisions. What was the position? When would there be permanent appointments? Consequence management was raised as a concern by the AG. In respect of irregular expenditure, none of the 198 incidents had been investigated. That was unacceptable, especially if the DCS was embracing the fight against corruption. He was not saying that all irregular expenditure was corrupt but the saying was that it was a likely place to start. DCS did not know what new corruption had taken place over last two years, or they did not care. Given the problems of Bosasa, he believed that the Committee should determine a specific timetable in respect of what DCS should report to the Committee in respect of the investigations into irregular expenditure. Fruitless and wasteful expenditure was scarcely any better with only three instances out of nearly 60 having been investigated.

Concerning bed spaces, Mr Horn admitted that a lot had already been asked but the DCS was making the new Minister a liar. In July, he had told South Africa that Tzaneen and Glencoe would be handed over by September 2019. Both institutions had a history of long delays. Now Mr Horn believed it would be handed over in November 2019. On the situation in Glencoe, there was complete silence. What was the situation in Glencoe? The Minister had also told the Committee in July that there would be site hand-overs in that financial year in Parys, Lichtenburg and Burgersdorp.

Regarding the Integrated Inmate Management System (IIMS), he repeated himself each time DCS presented a report: he did not believe that the Committee could place any reliance on reports on the IIMS. None of the targets had been met. The Chief Procurement Officer had advised cancellation of the contract owing to the lack of capacity of the service provider, and now officials were being blamed. A proper bid specification would have included the timely training of officials. The contract had been extended until the following year. Had the contractor been paid the full amount? If so, nothing would happen. At what stage did DCS cut its losses. The Bosasa contract had finally been cancelled without the skies falling. Had the issue of Bosasa not taught the Department anything? It was clear that IIMS was not progressing.

Mr Horn asked what processes or procedures were in place for establishing halfway houses. He was asking because of an experience in Bloemfontein where there had been a huge public outcry regarding the opening of a halfway house in a suburb without notification. The point was the comment of the owner of that house. The owner was not worried because she had been asked to procure a property for a halfway house by the ANC Secretary-General, Ace Magashule. Was there a transparent process for procuring halfway houses? What audit processes were there for where and how halfway houses were established?

Noting that the Minister had said that he would be at the meeting, but was not, Mr Horn hoped that the Deputy Minister could answer his question about the instance at which the Judicial Inspectorate had expressed amazement and a worry about filling positions in the Directorate for Support Services. The Deputy Minister was there at the time. JICS had been concerned about the refusal of the Department to open up the personnel management IT system, Persal, to finalise the appointment. Of a bigger concern, was the fact that the refusal was based on the fact that the National Commissioner and the Minister had ordered them via a letter to appoint someone who was not the preferred candidate. That should be a concern to the Committee. JICS, by its nature, had to be independent. How could they order JICS to appoint a person? He wanted to hear from the National Commissioner and the ministry how they could justify their actions.
 
Ms Maseko-Jele acknowledged the presence of the Deputy Minister. On slide 63 which dealt with the compensation of employees, the actual expenditure of R15.8 billion was 93.8% against an adjusted budget of R16.9 billion. She was looking at the amount spent on compensation of employees. She noted that of 175 senior management officials, only 170 members had signed performance agreements. What steps had been taken against those not signed? How many members had signed Performance Agreements in the current year? Why was the number of appointees so much lower than the number of people who had left the Department? DCS had had eight foreigners in the Department in April 2018 but at the end of March 2019, there were only seven. Why was DCS employing foreigners? Was it for specialist work? She required clarity.

On misconduct, Ms Maseko-Jele noted that repeated absence from work without leave was the most reported misconduct. 586 employees had been charged with dereliction of duty and 329 charged with breach of security measures. It was disturbing because DCS was a security environment. The Department spent so much money on personnel but that was what it produced. The Department had to start on a new footing in the new year. Most of the officials had been in the Department for quite some time and maybe when the Minister’s term of office ended, they would find themselves in the same position. She asked that DCS helped the Committee to help the Department.

On the report of the AG, Ms Maseko-Jele was glad that the Deputy Chairperson of the Internal Audit Committee was in attendance. The AG had said that the Committee had to do some work in its oversight. She had read his recommendations. The recommendation for DCS included designing an action plan and follow up on it, fill key vacancies, and put in place measures to curb irregular expenditure. She was sure that the DCS had put some things in place but she referred DCS to the AR, which she said the Committee should go through in detail with the Department to correct things, where the report talked about the top five areas of non-compliance: management of procurement and contracts, quality of financial statements, management of irregular and fruitless and wasteful expenditure, implementation of an action plan to manage performance, consequence management of officials. She was asking questions that her colleagues had asked because DCS needed to take care of those things, otherwise the Committee would be very harsh on the Department.

Ms Maseko-Jele turned to the report on fraud and corruption. Her colleagues had also referred to the issue. No fraud was identified in 2017/18 but in 2018/19, 36 possible cases of fraud were identified and were being investigated. She wanted a report on those. Mr Horn had mentioned the colours used by the AG to show progress. She asked the DCS to get those colours. A number of issues were yellow. Proper recording was not done There were no daily or monthly controls. That had to improve. Officials had to do something every day that they came to work. The audit committee had to check things monthly so that the managers could correct those things before the AG came. The Audit Committee was red in terms of governance. Risk management was red. DCS wanted to request permission from Parliament regarding the costs incurred in 2012/13. Exactly what was it that they wanted the Committee to do?

Ms Maseko-Jele said that she had received a good report on some of the criminals working in the community but they had complained that on their ID, they had an asterisk which showed that they were criminals and so everyone knew they were criminals. They were doing well in the programmes, so why could the asterisk not be removed? However, she did think it was a deterrent to young people. Could the Commissioner tell her how she was supposed to answer questions about the asterisk?

The Acting Chairperson reminded Members that there was to be a three-line whip that afternoon. Although Members could have all the time that they wanted as that was permissible, they had to remember that there were others.

Prof C Msimang (IFP) was largely covered by his colleagues. He would focus on Part E: Financial Matters. He would emphasise his concerns alongside those of his colleagues that had just spoken. Although the Committee was excited about clean audits, it was used to unqualified audits with findings but it was eyebrow raising when it came to qualified reports. When it came to the report and one took a span of five years from 2013/14 to 2018/19, DCS had obtained only one unqualified report. That was very concerning. It appeared that the Department was also concerned. It had come up with internal controls workshops but there was no change. There had been an audit plan about audit outcomes but there had been no turnaround. Were the strategies just talk shops and nothing happened, or did implementation happen but it fell short? His colleagues, one after another, had pointed that out in the meeting.

Ms W Newhoudt-Druchen (ANC) noted that 44 female offenders had been trained in hairdressing by DCS and service SETAs. Was that the only training for women? There were lists of programmes for men. Of the 77% Matric pass rate, how many were women? She wanted to know where the community offenders’ offices were and would be happy to wait for a written response. She congratulated the DCS on the increase in restorative justice. Did that number include victims of sexual or gender-based violence and was support given to victims? There had been a newspaper report on overcrowding in the Western Cape correctional facilities. What was the overcrowding rate, in all provinces? Referring to another media item, she asked how a convicted rapist, Mr Ninow, had said that he had had access to drugs in prison. What was DCS doing about that? How many sites providing ARVs were accredited?

Mr Dyantyi welcomed the presentation and thanked the Department for submitting the AR by the end of September. The Committee had read it. Stating the obvious was that the fact that DCS was the last in a queue of role-players protecting society. It went from police arresting criminals to courts to sending people to jail. DCS had to start with people who had been rejected by society and DCS had to deal with them in jail for a long time or with the hope that they should be rehabilitated. The job of DCS was a thankless one, so the team had to appreciate who they were and what they were doing, and see the questions coming from a point where the officials of DCS were appreciated by Members.

Mr Dyantyi referred directly to the Correctional Services AR for 2018/19. He started with the Deputy Minister’s overview where he had focused on the issue of re-offending. That was directly linked to rehabilitation so Mr Dyantyi asked what support was given to people who had been given skills in incarceration. Was there a programme that followed the former inmates and supported them so that they did not re-offend? He appreciated the innovative things such as the bakery project of 3 million loaves of bread at R5 a loaf. That saved a lot money and he was not sure if it had been quantified.

Addressing the National Commissioner, Mr Dyantyi pointed out that colleagues had shared their views on the 5 years’ audits which showed that the DCS was in bad shape. The last two years showed a reduction from 300 plus findings in the previous year to 204 findings in 2018/19. He had to acknowledge the improvement. Could that reduction be fast tracked? Could DCS tell the Committee 10 or 20 things that were outside the control of DCS, e.g. the Department of Public Work was not under DCS control, so that the Committee could monitor effectively. The Commissioner had lamented the lack of qualified senior staff. The Committee needed to know about that.

Mr Dyantyi asked the Commissioner about JICS. JICS had raised a number of challenges when the Deputy Minister was there. JICS had raised a number of challenges but there was an adversarial relationship between JICS and DCS, like IPID and SAPS. How could the relationship be fixed and why did DCS not do things requested by JICS? Mr Dyantyi also asked where the halfway houses were situated. He agreed with Ms Newhoudt-Druchen that the Committee needed that information in writing.

On page 32 in the AR, the Commissioner had made a point that during the following year the DCS would cooperate with the Chief Accountant. When was next year and why not now? What was DCS waiting for? Why not now? He noted that DCS wanted to conduct training on SCM. How long had the people been in SCM? Why did they have to be trained when they had been appointed because they were qualified in SCM. DCS was behaving as if training was the panacea of everything. Why were qualified people being trained to do their job? DCS wanted to conduct due diligence at head office of contracts signed at provincial level, but was that not already happening? If not, why not?

P33 – the gifts received from non-related sports and recreation: Mr Dyantyi asked who had made the donations. A list of donations did not have meaning without an explanation of what the gift was and who had donated. It was very important that the Committee knew who had donated gifts. It did not help if the Committee did not have that information. He wanted the information in writing. He was happy with halfway houses but not halfway measures!

HR p101- the SMS information on 31 March 2019: There were 43 vacant posts, which was a 20% vacancy. There no explanation given beyond the National Treasury moratorium on filling posts. Mr Dyantyi asked if departments just wanted to point out National Treasury’s moratorium.

P106– Mr Dyantyi referred to job evaluation and those jobs that had been upgraded during the period. He was interested in the highly skilled professionals.

P107 - Mr Dyantyi noted that his colleague had raised the matter of personnel vacancies but he wanted to go beyond her questions. The report showed there was 642 appointed but 1 594 people ran away in exodus. If there was no crisis, that was all that he needed to explain it. It was a case of less in and more out. DCS was not the Department of choice.  It explained why staff were leaving but he wanted to go to the disciplinary table which showed a Department at war with itself. There were so many cases of misconduct but only 118 dismissals. What was happening in the Department? DCS could never get stability if the people who were supposed to look after inmates and the department, were involved in misconduct. It was problematic. The table showing utilisation of leave showed that top management used a lot of leave.

P83 and P62: Mr Dyantyi said two targets that DCS had missed because it had come so close to the targets should not be counted as missed targets.

Finances (AR
P135 Legal services: the costs seemed to be very high, considering that the fees went mostly for paying legal fees for actions against their own staff. He wanted a breakdown of legal fees paid showing what the fees were for, e.g. CCMA, court, etc.

P137 – social benefits: all of those issues from municipalities, households, etc showed a significant over-expenditure. 588% over-expenditure, etc. It went to thousands of percentages in some cases. Something had to be horribly wrong. What was happening? The CFO needed to explain that.

P173 – Mr Dyantyi referred to an explanation of variances of R15 billion that had been adjusted. Goods and services were at R6 billion. DCS’s explanation was that it was operating leases and accommodation charges. The interest on land from a zero budget to overspend by R2 million. That was bad planning. He required an explanation.

P 174Transfers and subsidies – post-retirement services: Mr Dyantyi stated that one knew exactly who would be retiring. A department could anticipate retirements. He knew when he would retire based on his age.

Post-retirement expenditure – at what point had the DCS realised that those people would retire. Those were flimsy explanations that were not helpful.

Ms J Mofokeng (ANC) stated that many of her questions had been covered but she was concerned about the criteria for getting into safe houses. Concerning performance agreements, why had five not been signed? She thanked the DCS for giving an education to the young people and ensuring the pass rate, etc. The opening of the school was commendable. She also commended the qualified audit status. She noted the problems of overcrowding but the Minister and the Deputy Minister had to look at that. However, she noted the problem with the Department of Public Works (DPW) which was a problem across departments and said that there had to be a joint meeting with DCS and DPW.

Ms Mofokeng noted that there was no comment on the juveniles. Were they at schools? That was very important. She asked about the challenges experienced in Administration where only 7 out of 11 targets had been achieved. The reasons for the resignation did not give information about what the Department had learned from the exit interviews and what plans it had for retaining staff. Regarding the SMS structure, she wanted to know why there were 73 women and 97 men. When was the Department going to reach the 50% target for women? What about the staff with a disability? No numbers were given for resignations. Had any of those people resigned and, if so, what had their challenges been? She commented on the eight foreigners as workers in DCS. Why employ them? Did they have rare skills? There were SAs who were not working.

Ms Mofokeng noted the number of people who participated in spiritual services. No wonder so many ex-convicts became pastors. Was the number given that of churches and spiritual organisations or was it the number of inmates? It was not clear. How far had the DCS gone in implementing the judgement regarding the transgender inmate? The parole boards at different prisons were in the media. Why did they not operate uniformly? When would DCS give them the information that it needed about the challenges experienced with the way that the parole boards were run? She noted that there had been many complaints that DCS never engaged in public participation and never educated the community on parole boards?

Noting the stakeholders that were working with DCS, she asked how the NGOs were appointed and how many had been appointed? She had received a letter the previous day and would share with the Deputy Minister. The letter indicated that 35 women from Mondeor in Johannesburg wanted to know why they were not considered for parole when wrong people were paroled. The Deputy Minister should address that but she would first share the letter with the Chairperson of the Correctional Services Sub-Committee.  There was legislation about parole but it appeared that some of the people working in parole boards, did not care about the victims. People were only given a short to prepare for parole. Some people knew all about parole and others did not. All SAs needed to know their rights regarding parole. She asked the Deputy Minister about the Bapoo judgement.

Ms Newhoudt-Druchen had remembered her last question. She noted that on slide 54 on vacancies, if she took the total divided by the vacancies, she came to 10.76 % but the average indicated on the slide was 5%. How was the average worked out?

The Acting Chairperson had a few questions and indicated that the answers could be supplied in writing. He asked for an update on the investigation by the SIU on the five proclamations. He also had a serious concern regarding compliance by DCS with competitive bidding processes in cases where contracts were beyond R500 000.  What was the situation there?

The Acting Chairperson thanked the Commission and the Deputy Minister and called for a brief break in proceedings.

Responses by DCS
The National Commissioner informed the Acting Chairperson that that his staff would respond to the questions. If there was anything not answered at the end, he would address those questions.

Incarceration
Ms Vuyi Mlomo-Ndlovu, Acting Chief Deputy Commissioner: Remand Operations Management, DCS, stated that there were three categories of mentally ill patients. Critically ill or mentally patients were sent to a psychiatrist as it was difficult to keep mentally ill patients without their having treatment. DCS had observation cases and in those cases it referred the inmate to the relevant hospitals but there was nothing DCS could do while that person was on a waiting list. State patients were the outcome of the observation cases. Timeframes were not always clear, although DCS should have such patients only for a short time. The law said that there should be 14 days from when the court referred the person to the Department of Health (DoH) and then there were 14 days which DoH should utilise to place the patient, but there was a shortage of state hospital beds so the DoH visited inmates while they were still in correctional services. The shortage was particularly bad in Eastern Cape where patients were being visited by psychiatrists while still in correctional service facilities. Severely mentally ill persons who were DCS inmates could be referred to the mental establishments but after stabilisation, they were sent back to DCS.

Ms Mlomo-Ndlovu explained that the pastoral care figures in the AR referred to the number of inmates who participated in individual care sessions offered by full-time care DCS staff and registered service providers from churches that were registered with DCS. The statistics were based on all services rendered.

She added that all AVR sites were all accredited.

Security
Mr Lucky Mthethwa, Chief Security Officer, DCS, responded to the question regarding the discrepancy between DCS and JICS statistics (58 versus 103) in respect of unnatural deaths. JICS reported on all reported deaths. DCS reported only on those confirmed by medical practitioners as unnatural. There would be no similarity in numbers. There were preventive measures to deal with the issue. The Assault Preventative Plan was being implemented in all facilities and where it was not implemented, there were consequence measures.

Mr Mthethwa stated that the target regarding escapes had been achieved. There had been 56 escapes and there had been a re-arrest of 44 of the escapees. It was an increase of six escapes from 2017/18 to 2018/19 because of the mass escape of the remandees in Johannesburg. The reasons for the escapes had been staff not complying and an element of corrupt activities. People had been arrested and consequence management had been implemented. DCS had a plan to enforce policies and procedures regarding security and encouraged surprise visits by management and the security committees established as required by legislation in all Department. DCS had diagnosed the problems and had come up with preventative measures and, in so doing, had achieved the target.

On drugs, he explained that one drug entering the facilities was one too many. It was not accepted. If it happened, it meant that the authority of the state was being diminished so DCS had a plan to keep up with the attempts to smuggle in drugs in line with the changing environment which was brought about by, among other things, the 4th Industrial Revolution. DCS had identified emergency security teams to assist in searches and actively participated with other government services involved in rooting out illegal substances. That had produced good results. He could not report on the details because the matter was sub judice and some DCS members were involved. A team was working with other institutions in trying to come up with a masterplan regarding contraband and security. One of the grey areas was the lack of security personnel and DCS was working on a new security model as it was one of the pillars of DCS. The Department was working closely with JCSP cluster to address security concerns and other organisations such as CSIR.

CDC Katenga responded to the calculation of the vacancy rate. It was based on the staff complement of 41 463. 38 344 posts were filled which equalled 92.5% of the establishment. Taking that figure from 100% gave one a 7.5% vacancy rate. He also responded to the question on therapeutic diets on page 83 where the planned target was 12% and the actual achievement was just over. DCS did not want to exceed 12%

Human Resources
Mr Moeketsi Mashibini, CDC for Human Resources, DCS, responded to the issue of foreign workers. They were usually spiritual workers employed on a month-to-month to render religious care. In respect of discipline, the AR shows 118 dismissals. Mr Dyantyi had commented that the Department was fighting with itself. On page 122 of the AR indicates the different types of misconduct. 34 officials were charged for using property of state without permission, e.g. officials who were renting out their houses and pocketing the money. That was serious. Assaulting offenders and colleagues and sleeping on duty were serious offences as they threatened the safety of their own colleagues in the operating environment. DCS had to take strict measures. Resolution 1 of 2002 for non-SMS members and the SMS conduct handbook regulated the statutory conditions. In both, serious versus non-serious conduct offences were identified. Non-serious offences could be addressed with written warnings, etc. but serious offences resulted in people being dismissed from the Service.

He explained the process of job evaluation which upgraded officials using the tool provided by the Public Service and Administration. It was important for the retention of members. Especially in SCM, people in those areas were employed at a higher level in other departments and so the people were moving to other departments because they were appointed at higher levels and paid more for the same work. Hence the upgrading of posts to levels comparable with other departments.

Mr Mashibini explained that the vacancy rate was an historical problem. When he had assumed the portfolio, he had seen how high the vacancy rate was and he had gone back through the ARs from 2013/14 and found that there had been a high vacancy rate each year.  DCS had needed to understand the problem before attempting to remedy the situation. One challenge that he had found in filling critical posts was that the appointment processes were centralised at head office because of section 96(3) of the Act which provided that all appointments above Director level had to take place in conjunction with the Minister and the Head of Department. That meant that no one from the regions could make appointments from the level of a Director and above. The DCS would be recommending the decentralisation of the appointment process. Currently, the selection panel had to include the Minister or Deputy Minister and high level appointments such as the Head of Department and Regional Heads and they were never available. The Division had decided to indicate in the appointment letter to the panel that the process had to be finalised by a particular date. In addition, shortlisted candidates often had excuses for not attending and so the panel had to be re-scheduled for one person to be interviewed and it was a struggle to get the panel back again. It was said to be a strategy of some candidates so that they could get questions from other candidates before they were interviewed. They were investigating the truth of that information but currently DCS was requiring a letter from the doctor for an absence from an interview.

He added that another problem was the disappearance of appointment submissions. When people were not happy with an appointment, the entire file with all the certificates and information disappeared. Now, the policy was that there had to be copies of submissions and certificates. He had investigated and had held officials accountable for that practice. Another challenge was that some senior managers participated in several interview processes. When that person did their job, he did not know, but such a person delayed other processes. One was now allowed to participate in no more than two interview panels at a time. DCS also had to rely on the assistance of experts for certain posts and so people from other departments were requested to assist on the panels. That also delayed interviews.

Mr Mashibini added that intermittent and unscheduled advertising of posts had not made the process any easier. DCS now had one recruitment drive in a year so that all candidates could move through the selection process at the same time. The CDC posts would be advertised this coming weekend. The posts had been kept together. Of the 31 posts advertised, 18 were for shortlisting and 10 candidates had been moved horizontally into the posts. DCS would fill 30 SMS posts by the end of December 2019.

In responding to questions on exit interview, he stated that the Department had learned about the reasons why people left. 425 had resigned. Mr Mashibini had called them and asked them to reconsider the position but the people were looking for better salaries. They just wanted to get more money because they were heavily indebted. Others wanted transfers to the departments that offered better conditions. He had tried but it was difficult to change someone’s mind.

Officials who did not signing the performance agreement were sent a non-performance letter. The Department made the person aware that he or she would not benefit from any pay progression or bonuses as a result of not signing the letter. To make sure everyone was aware of the issue, DCS would be conducting workshops where all senior members in the Department would be taken through the performance agreement so that employees could understand why they would not enjoy benefits. The Department was also considering consequence management.

He pointed out that it was not only senior managers who were frequently sick but it was also junior managers and members on the ground. Years ago, HR practitioners used to visit the person to see if he or she was in the bed. They also questioned the doctor. But that was now outside the ambit of the law and the employer could not ask why a person was booked off by a medical practitioner.

Mr Mashibini agreed that not much had been done about equity. However, the current process was intended to address that problem. Only under extreme circumstances, would DCS not reach the target. 0.7% of the employees were disabled but the DCS would engage relevant institutions to encourage physically disabled persons to apply for positions. He added that some facilities were not disability friendly.

IT Management
Nthabiseng Msupye stated that the service provider for the IIMS had been paid on deliverables and so had not been paid in full.

Court Judgement
Ms Mlomo-Ndlovu responded to the query about the Phaahla judgement which had given DCS 24 months to make changes in the Correctional Services Act but DCS had had to implement the judgement immediately. A circular had been sent out on 30 May 2019 explaining all the processes to identify all offenders who had to be reviewed to comply with the Phaahla judgement. 50 inmates had benefitted. The National Commissioner had decided to appoint a task team to manage the changes to the Act. The Bill process was very long but the official would make proposed amendments and send it through all the relevant structures to get the Bill to Parliament. A delay was caused by contemplation as to whether those changes should be included in the review that DCS was undertaking of the entire Act. However, as the timeframe was only 24 months, DCS had made the decision to amend the current Act in order to meet the deadline.

Adv Breytenbach asked if DCS would make it within the 24 months.

Facilities
Dr Botha responded to questions on bed spaces. The 12 bed spaces in C-Max project had been finalised in the previous year and DCS had received the occupancy certificate. In terms of bed spaces, DCS was challenged, which was why the task team had been appointed to look at bed spaces. The initial increase of 12 bed spaces, although the project had been to transform the facility from a prison to a correctional centre and bed spaces had been a spin-off. The project had been delayed but a great achievement was the fact that the facility was totally off the grid when it came to hot water, thanks to the solar system. The Department embraced technology and would use that as a model for other centres.

The Standerton facility had been delayed due to water shedding because of the drought and the municipality had cut off the water supply for construction work. However, the facility had been opened in May 2019. Glencoe was a refurbishment project as a result of which 660 bed spaces were regained at the end of June 2019. DCS had received the occupancy and construction certificates. The Parys site was handed over to the contractor in February 2019. It was one of the projects given to the Development Bank of Southern Africa (DBSA) because DPW was so slow. DCS did not want to sit around and then come to the Committee and complain about DPW as DCS was responsible for the facility. The contractor was making good progress. DCS had signed a Memorandum of Agreement with the DBSA for several projects because of challenges with DPW.

Responding to the question on the costs of the Tzaneen facility, Dr Botha reminded the Committee that the contractor had been liquidated but added that the majority of the costs of the new contractor would be paid from a suspension account into which funds for the penalty clauses had been paid. It had been a challenging site since the contractor had been liquidated. There had been theft of cables during the break from construction and the previous contractor had taken some shortcuts that had had to be addressed. Weekly project meetings were held on site. The envisaged hand-over date was the end of November 2019. As soon as a Department had an expansion of over 20% or R2 million on a construction project, it had to get a Variation Order from National Treasury as per the National Treasury Note. Waiting for National Treasury approval had caused further delays.

The Burgersdorp facility was a new centre in the Eastern Cape with 311 bed spaces. Plans had been finalised and the tender would go out for a contractor before the end of the year and the intention was to start on the first day of the 2020/21 financial year. With the Lichtenburg facility, the environmental assessment report was outstanding from the local municipality but DCS had recruited a professional team to work on the project and it was anticipated that the tender would go out before the end of December so that that the contractor could also start on the first day of the 2020/21 financial year.

Regarding the allegations of overcrowding in the Western Cape, Dr Botha explained that DCS was planning to renovate an old, decommissioned centre at Brandvlei which would give 690 bed spaces in an area where they were needed. Consultants were currently being appointed.

Finance
Mr Ligege, said that there were three cases of irregular or fruitless and wasteful expenditure which related to family members being involved. There had not been any investigations as there was not a dedicated investigating unit that dealt with irregular expenditure but the Department had resuscitated a Chief Directorate called Internal Control and Compliance. It was consolidated with the Chief Directorate for Risk Management, although those inspectors also had other work to do to do with service evaluation of management and regions.

He informed the Committee that the conflict of interest had come about when the AG ran the Computer-Assisted Audit Techniques (CATT) system in which the AG linked data across the organs of state and found 154 cases of possible conflict of interest. DCS did the investigations to find evidence of misconduct and had come up with 28 cases out of the 154 where it found officials of other departments were doing work with DCS. DCS could only access the employee records of government departments. Those cases were being referred to their employers. There had been 36 cases in which officials had resigned or were deceased and the cases had to be closed. There were 13 cases where officials were found not to be working for the Public Service. 49 cases found some conflict by officials of DCS and those had been to their area supervisors or directors who had to do consequence management by 30 October 2019. 38 cases were still being investigated. It was hoped that all cases would be closed by March 2020.

Mr Ligege explained that the irregular expenditure and fruitless and wasteful expenditure cases were being investigated but the DCS had been previously been unable to reconcile national and provincial records as it had not had a database. In the 2018/19 AR, DCS had explained that 80% of the irregularities could be attributed to three cases: Independent Development Trust (IDT) amounting to R1,816 million, the Nutrition contract at R707 million (since concluded), and one was a contract with the Department of Higher Education from 2014. The three cases could not be concluded until all investigations were complete. Together the amount was R2.7 billion. Other cases were being investigated. DCS had concluded 750 out 875 cases in respect of irregular expenditure, and 146 cases out of 249 cases of fruitless and wasteful expenditure.

The New Framework required all those cases be sent to the National Treasury Chief Procurement Office as National Treasury wanted to take away the responsibility from Accounting Officers. CDC Ligege added that in the Forum of CFOs, a concern had been raised that National Treasury might not have the capacity to manage all the cases that would come through.

Responding to Mr Dyantyi’s concerns about the strategic management only being done in the following year, Mr Ligege explained that the report was referring to the 2019/20 financial year and the Department would have the first round of contracts ready by the end of June 2020. The changes of the SCM prescripts had taught DCS that there had to be continuous training. For example, there were new procurement rules regarding designated groups and people had to be trained in the new rules. Bid reviews had been taking place since 2016 and irregular expenditure had been prevented but the tenders had been stopped and that meant that there were no contracts for food and hygiene so those items had been bought on quotation but, because a contract ought to have been in place, everything spent over the time without a contract had to be added up and then that had exceeded the relevant authority. Combatting one form of irregular expenditure had led to another. He would provide details regarding gifts in writing.

The legal case expenditure was mainly related to motions regarding parole. The post-retirement benefits related to medical aid payments to GEMS. Some retirees received 100% funding of their medical aid. Payment of such funds used to be under CoE budget but that expenditure was no longer under CoE but had to be placed under Household. When the budget had been appropriated by Parliament, the budget for those post-retirement benefits had been in the wrong place. CDC Ligege stated that DCS was waiting the approval of Parliament in order to align the expenditure.

Mr Ligege responded to Adv Breytenbach’s question about the write-offs of the Integrated Justice System (IJS). DCS participated in the Department of Justice IJS programme through its IIMS programme. The process of claiming funds meant one spent the funds, raised a debtor and invoiced the DoJ&CD. However, because IIMS had been found to be non-compliant as it was not procured through the State Information Technology Agency (SITA), DoJ&CD could not pay against those invoices until IIMS was cleared by SITA. The debt had been raised in 2015/16. The funding was impaired and therefore was written off.

He added that entertainment expenditure related to entertainment by the Ministry when it had engagements with stakeholders.

Conclusion
The Acting Chairperson asked for the remaining answers in writing as there was a House sitting that afternoon.

The National Commissioner agreed that he would respond in writing. He thanked the Acting Chairperson and the Committee for the frank engagement. He acknowledged Mr Dyantyi’s remarks and said that it was important for his staff that they heard that their work was appreciated because some of the people at the coal face had a thankless task. DCS was a huge institution and should not be underestimated. He took full responsibility but it was going to take time to get the DCS aligned to the service model and get greater alignment. The Department wanted assess the impact. They did not work in a vacuum as they were at the front end of the social cluster. He looked forward to further engagement.

The Deputy Minister commented on the question of JICS. The matter was dealt with by the National Commissioner and the Judge and the matter was taken to DPSA. The National Commissioner had to appoint officials but JICS had to be seen to be independent. Regarding assistance to offenders, one could only do so much: receive offenders, try to rehabilitate them and give them skills and then release them. Thereafter, it was the responsibility of the community and other departments to ensure that the skills were used. It was not illegal to employ a person with a criminal record but they had to declare what kind of life they had had. For example, when asked where they had obtained their qualifications, they would have to reveal that it was in correctional services. The Minister had instructed him to work very closely with the Department.

The Acting Chairperson asked if seven days would be sufficient for the responses from DCS.

The National Commissioner agreed to the deadline.

Mr Dyantyi asked the Chairperson to inform DCS about the Sub-Committee on Correctional Services.

The Acting Chairperson informed DCS that the Sub-Committee on Correctional Services would deal with many of the matters but something like an AR would not be delegated to the Sub-Committee.

The meeting was adjourned.
Election of Acting Chairperson
The Committee Secretary, Mr Vhonani Ramaano, opened the meeting and welcomed the Members.

He presented apologies from the Chairperson, who was, unfortunately, engaged in a meeting on Chapter Nine Institutions. The Secretary called for nominations, explaining that if more than one person was nominated, he would call for a vote. Adv H Mohammed (ANC) was nominated unopposed.

Opening remarks
The Acting Chairperson thanked Members for their confidence in him and reminded them that the Chairperson had tendered an apology. He also noted an apology from the Minister of Justice and Correctional Services, Mr Ronald Lamola, who was attending a strategic planning session of the Department of Justice and Constitutional Development. He noted that the Deputy Minister, Nkosi Phathekile Holomisa, would be arriving shortly. He welcomed the delegation from the Department of Correctional Services (DCS), especially the National Commissioner who would present the 2018/19 Annual Report and the successes, challenges and more particularly the goals of 2018/19. He was looking forward to the report.

Briefing by the Department of Correctional Services (DCS)
Mr Arthur Fraser, National Commissioner, DCS, stated that the Deputy Minister had intended to present the introduction but he would be joining the meeting soon, having been held up by air traffic.

The Commissioner said that in the year under review the organisation had achieved 82% of all targets set. DCS had achieved 100% of the Rehabilitation and Care targets which were at the centre of the rehabilitation and care process. The skills development programmes were critical. DCS had put in place certain interventions, such as a single operational centre and reviewing the current structures.

The Chairperson welcomed the Deputy Minister, Nkosi Holomisa.

The Deputy Minister thanked the Committee for the opportunity to present the Annual Report for 2018/19. On a number of areas, targets had been achieved but in others, the Department had fallen short and needed to pay better attention to areas highlighted by the Auditor-General (AG).

The Deputy Minister was pleased that DCS had opened a new high school named Tari Liswa (New Leaf) for Grade 10 to 12 learners. The Cradock Correctional Centre School had been opened. The Department wanted all young inmates to complete a Senior Certificate or at least complete Grade 9 or Adult Basic Education and Training Level 4.

Aimed at maintaining the wellbeing of inmates in its custody, the Department had provided a comprehensive package of healthcare services and programmes to inmates which included primary health care, nutrition, hygiene and pharmaceutical services. Approximately 99% of those tested positive for HIV had been put on medication.
                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                       
The Deputy Minister added that the Department would prioritise its ongoing engagement with the community in the current year and pay attention to irregular and fruitless and wasteful expenditure. In conclusion, he                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                        thanked Members of the Committee for their continued support and guidance.

The Acting Chairperson thanked the Deputy Minister and asked the National Commissioner to present the report on the R23.8 billion budget of DCS.

DCS Annual Report 2018/19
The National Commissioner handed over to the, Chief Deputy Commissioner for Strategic Management, Mr Joseph Katenga, to present the Annual Report for 2018/19.

Safety and Security at correctional facilities
Mr Katenga informed the Committee that overcrowding, staff shortages and aging infrastructure were significant contributing factors to security incidents at correctional facilities but the intensification of management supervision had led to a decrease in the number of reported cases of assault of inmates. 24 attempted escapes had been foiled and 164 attempted suicides were prevented during the 2018/19 financial year. The total inmate population in 2018/19 was 162 875, down from 164 129 in 2017/18. In 2018/19, there had been 54 935 parolees, 15 251 probationers and 1 387 awaiting trial persons.

The Department had a post establishment of 41 463 as at March 2019 with 3 119 vacant positions as a result of the ceiling on compensation of employees (CoE) budget imposed by National Treasury. Of the 38 annual targets, 31 had been achieved. Administration and Incarceration targets had not been reached and one social integration target had not been reached. The targets not achieved included:
- completion of the Integrated Inmate Management System (IIMS)
- an audit without qualifications
- the number of unnatural deaths
- the number of new bed spaces created
- the number of parolees and probationers reintegrated into communities through halfway houses.

The Acting Chairperson asked DCS to focus on the challenges and to explain why indicators had not been met.

Mr Q Dyantyi (ANC) indicated that Members had read the report and would rather spend more time engaging with the Department.

Ms Nthabiseng Mosupye, Government Information Technical Officer, DCS, explained that the IIMS for core business processes had been delayed because officials found use of the system overwhelming and the facial recognition and fingerprints capability could not be completed on time. The Department was being assisted by a service provider whose contract had been extended by one year. The DCS staff were being trained to manage and enhance the system in the future and there were no additional costs to the Department for the extension of the contract.

Dr Riaan Botha, Acting Deputy Commissioner: Facilities, explained that the intention had been to create additional bed spaces through new construction of correctional centres and upgrade projects:
-C-Max project for 12 beds had been completed in 2018.
-Escort facility was completed after the end of the financial year in May 2019.
-Standerton facility was also finalised in the new financial year, i.e. in May 2019.
-New facilities in Tzaneen targeted for 2018/19 had not been completed. It was currently 99% complete after the contractor had been liquidated and the new contractor promised completion in November 2019.

Dr Botha explained that, in the past, DCS could not update the bed space figures which were moving targets as cells became dilapidated or were re-commissioned because the Department had used a paper system to update the figures. However, DCS was now auditing all bed spaces, re-measuring all cells and calculating actual bed spaces. 220 out of 243 institutions had been completed and captured on the IT system.

The Acting Chairperson asked if penalties had applied when contracts were changed and whether the deviations were authorised.

Mr Dyantyi asked that the Acting Chairperson hold back on the questions and the detail and allow DCS to run through the presentation.

The Acting Chairperson said that he had asked DCS only to zoom into targets not achieved.

Ms N Maseko-Jele (ANC) suggested that the DCS should proceed and complete the presentation.

Fraud and corruption
Mr Katenga informed the Committee that 218 incidents had been reported; a total of 609 cases and 342 enquiries had been brought forward from previous years. 1 777 investigations had been finalised, in 34 cases prima facie evidence of misconduct had been found and disciplinary proceedings were initiated. 32 disciplinary hearings had found 31 officials guilty.

Financial matters
Mr Nick Ligege,CFO, DCS, stated that DCS had received a qualified audit but the number of findings had steadily decreased from 588 findings in 2014/15 to 204 findings in 2018/19. Many of the 2018/19 findings related to commitments and irregular expenditure. DCS had a total budget R23.85 billion and an underspend of R72 million.

There had been an issue with AGSA as the auditors had wanted reports on the work done by the Department of Public Works but that would have created a system of double reporting. The AG’s position had been modified.

Causes of Negative Audit Outcomes
The supply chain management (SCM) had been faced with changing prescripts and complex accounting standards in addition to the challenge of vacancies due to budget cuts. There had been a lack of capacity within SCM and the Finance Unit. The high dependency on manual processes to generate information and reports had resulted in a high error rate. DCS had also encountered the problem of a lack of understanding of Modified Cash Standards (MCS) of Reporting by non-financial managers and that had resulted in incomplete, inaccurate reporting and non-compliance with MCS. There had been constant changes and an unclear supply management regulatory environment with many directives from National Treasury.

Measures taken to address audit outcomes
The Department had developed an Audit Outcomes Turnaround Plan that required: training and capacitation of SCM and Financial Management components, automation of processes for performance information, SCM and Finance, and a review of Governance structures and policies.

DCS would conduct internal control workshops and indabas to enhance understanding of regulatory environment and improve internal control maturity, maintain audit files for all work done to improve controls.
Measures would be undertaken to address audit outcomes including the finalisation of the investigations of irregular, fruitless and wasteful expenditure. The Department would also review the entire population of commitments and irregular expenditure to ensure complete and accurate disclosures.

Discussion
Adv G Breytenbach (DA) noted that the most common type of misconduct was absenteeism or repeated absenteeism from work without a valid reason or permission with 1 271 cases; dereliction of duties with 586 cases and breaching of security measures with 329 cases. What had been the outcome of the disciplinary hearings? What was a typical sanction? Four people had been given a final written warning for corruption. What sort of corruption had it been and was that a typical sanction?

Adv Breytenbach noted that the shortage of bed space was currently at 37% and yet not one bed space had been created in the year. Zero out of a target of 435. Twelves bed spaces were created at C-Max during upgrades but could not be verified by the AG. What was the percentage overcrowding in C-Max? Could DCS explain the complete failure in that area?

Adv Breytenbach asked about the 58 unnatural deaths in 2018/19. It was way too many. What were the causes? The Judicial Inspectorate for Correctional Services (JICS) suggested that the figure was 103 unnatural deaths. Could DCS explain the discrepancy? Why had there been an increase to 56 escapes? Why had there been an increase? How many had been re-arrested? What crimes had they been in for? What had been done to address the particular issue? Were any charges instituted against staff members, and, if so, what were the outcomes and sanction? Regarding inmates with mental illnesses, what was the plan to deal with that? What was being done to assist those inmates? 100% of the budget for that area had been spent but only 66% of the target had been reached. Could DCS explain the discrepancy?

Regarding various sums written off, Adv Breytenbach asked if DCS could explain why R76.9 million was written off as other material losses. What did that mean? R68.23 million was written off as loss on Integrated Justice System. Could DCS explain what that meant? The AG had expressed concern about a lack of consequence management. How would that be dealt with? The entertainment budget had tripled. What entertainment did the budget pay for? Rehabilitation, including salary, was at 7% of the annual budget. That made a mockery of the rehabilitation as a strategic goal and meant that DCS was just providing a very expensive warehousing service. How did the Department intend to deal with that matter? It was an ongoing issue and raised every year.

Adv Breytenbach noted that responses from the previous meeting had not been submitted. When could the Committee look forward to receiving those responses? DCS had agreed to supply information regarding the implementation of the Phaahla judgement. Could DCS provide the Committee with the information as Members were unable to respond to queries in that regard. DCS spoke of danger zones where it was not able to monitor parolees. The Committee had not received the update. What was the current position?
She had directed an enquiry regarding a proposed parole to a Mr Smalberger whose immediate response had been that he had forwarded the question to the Division dealing with Incarceration and stated that the Acting DCS head of Incarceration would handle it. That was in early September. She had received no response or acknowledgement from that Division despite the email being sent to several officials. Why? If she was having that much difficulty in getting a response, how difficult was it for anyone else?

Mr W Horn (DA) said, bearing in mind that the National Commissioner had taken office just after the beginning of the financial year under discussion and he had assured the then Committee that he had already been appraised of all the challenges, both the audit outcome and the performance report was very worrying. He noted the CFO’s comment that the number of findings had come down but the AG had told the Committee that there had been a regression in terms of financial and other reporting. He asked the National Commissioner about the system of colours of green, yellow and red. The AG had said that there was a regression in terms of assurances on the part of the Executive Authority. That meant that the National Commissioner had not been available when they had wanted to raise issues with him and when they did meet with him, there had been a non-committal approach regarding issues that had to be addressed immediately or it would affect the audit outcomes. The rest was history. What was the National Commissioner going to do about it and what should the Committee conclude regarding that issue?

Mr Horn said that the National Commissioner, in his address to the Committee, had talked about a review of corporate governance structures. What was the outcome of the review? The AG also pointed out that there had been five acting Chief Deputy Commissioners (CDCs) during the year. That created instability as acting people did not take tough decisions. What was the position? When would there be permanent appointments? Consequence management was raised as a concern by the AG. In respect of irregular expenditure, none of the 198 incidents had been investigated. That was unacceptable, especially if the DCS was embracing the fight against corruption. He was not saying that all irregular expenditure was corrupt but the saying was that it was a likely place to start. DCS did not know what new corruption had taken place over last two years, or they did not care. Given the problems of Bosasa, he believed that the Committee should determine a specific timetable in respect of what DCS should report to the Committee in respect of the investigations into irregular expenditure. Fruitless and wasteful expenditure was scarcely any better with only three instances out of nearly 60 having been investigated.

Concerning bed spaces, Mr Horn admitted that a lot had already been asked but the DCS was making the new Minister a liar. In July, he had told South Africa that Tzaneen and Glencoe would be handed over by September 2019. Both institutions had a history of long delays. Now Mr Horn believed it would be handed over in November 2019. On the situation in Glencoe, there was complete silence. What was the situation in Glencoe? The Minister had also told the Committee in July that there would be site hand-overs in that financial year in Parys, Lichtenburg and Burgersdorp.

Regarding the Integrated Inmate Management System (IIMS), he repeated himself each time DCS presented a report: he did not believe that the Committee could place any reliance on reports on the IIMS. None of the targets had been met. The Chief Procurement Officer had advised cancellation of the contract owing to the lack of capacity of the service provider, and now officials were being blamed. A proper bid specification would have included the timely training of officials. The contract had been extended until the following year. Had the contractor been paid the full amount? If so, nothing would happen. At what stage did DCS cut its losses. The Bosasa contract had finally been cancelled without the skies falling. Had the issue of Bosasa not taught the Department anything? It was clear that IIMS was not progressing.

Mr Horn asked what processes or procedures were in place for establishing halfway houses. He was asking because of an experience in Bloemfontein where there had been a huge public outcry regarding the opening of a halfway house in a suburb without notification. The point was the comment of the owner of that house. The owner was not worried because she had been asked to procure a property for a halfway house by the ANC Secretary-General, Ace Magashule. Was there a transparent process for procuring halfway houses? What audit processes were there for where and how halfway houses were established?

Noting that the Minister had said that he would be at the meeting, but was not, Mr Horn hoped that the Deputy Minister could answer his question about the instance at which the Judicial Inspectorate had expressed amazement and a worry about filling positions in the Directorate for Support Services. The Deputy Minister was there at the time. JICS had been concerned about the refusal of the Department to open up the personnel management IT system, Persal, to finalise the appointment. Of a bigger concern, was the fact that the refusal was based on the fact that the National Commissioner and the Minister had ordered them via a letter to appoint someone who was not the preferred candidate. That should be a concern to the Committee. JICS, by its nature, had to be independent. How could they order JICS to appoint a person? He wanted to hear from the National Commissioner and the ministry how they could justify their actions.
 
Ms Maseko-Jele acknowledged the presence of the Deputy Minister. On slide 63 which dealt with the compensation of employees, the actual expenditure of R15.8 billion was 93.8% against an adjusted budget of R16.9 billion. She was looking at the amount spent on compensation of employees. She noted that of 175 senior management officials, only 170 members had signed performance agreements. What steps had been taken against those not signed? How many members had signed Performance Agreements in the current year? Why was the number of appointees so much lower than the number of people who had left the Department? DCS had had eight foreigners in the Department in April 2018 but at the end of March 2019, there were only seven. Why was DCS employing foreigners? Was it for specialist work? She required clarity.

On misconduct, Ms Maseko-Jele noted that repeated absence from work without leave was the most reported misconduct. 586 employees had been charged with dereliction of duty and 329 charged with breach of security measures. It was disturbing because DCS was a security environment. The Department spent so much money on personnel but that was what it produced. The Department had to start on a new footing in the new year. Most of the officials had been in the Department for quite some time and maybe when the Minister’s term of office ended, they would find themselves in the same position. She asked that DCS helped the Committee to help the Department.

On the report of the AG, Ms Maseko-Jele was glad that the Deputy Chairperson of the Internal Audit Committee was in attendance. The AG had said that the Committee had to do some work in its oversight. She had read his recommendations. The recommendation for DCS included designing an action plan and follow up on it, fill key vacancies, and put in place measures to curb irregular expenditure. She was sure that the DCS had put some things in place but she referred DCS to the AR, which she said the Committee should go through in detail with the Department to correct things, where the report talked about the top five areas of non-compliance: management of procurement and contracts, quality of financial statements, management of irregular and fruitless and wasteful expenditure, implementation of an action plan to manage performance, consequence management of officials. She was asking questions that her colleagues had asked because DCS needed to take care of those things, otherwise the Committee would be very harsh on the Department.

Ms Maseko-Jele turned to the report on fraud and corruption. Her colleagues had also referred to the issue. No fraud was identified in 2017/18 but in 2018/19, 36 possible cases of fraud were identified and were being investigated. She wanted a report on those. Mr Horn had mentioned the colours used by the AG to show progress. She asked the DCS to get those colours. A number of issues were yellow. Proper recording was not done There were no daily or monthly controls. That had to improve. Officials had to do something every day that they came to work. The audit committee had to check things monthly so that the managers could correct those things before the AG came. The Audit Committee was red in terms of governance. Risk management was red. DCS wanted to request permission from Parliament regarding the costs incurred in 2012/13. Exactly what was it that they wanted the Committee to do?

Ms Maseko-Jele said that she had received a good report on some of the criminals working in the community but they had complained that on their ID, they had an asterisk which showed that they were criminals and so everyone knew they were criminals. They were doing well in the programmes, so why could the asterisk not be removed? However, she did think it was a deterrent to young people. Could the Commissioner tell her how she was supposed to answer questions about the asterisk?

The Acting Chairperson reminded Members that there was to be a three-line whip that afternoon. Although Members could have all the time that they wanted as that was permissible, they had to remember that there were others.

Prof C Msimang (IFP) was largely covered by his colleagues. He would focus on Part E: Financial Matters. He would emphasise his concerns alongside those of his colleagues that had just spoken. Although the Committee was excited about clean audits, it was used to unqualified audits with findings but it was eyebrow raising when it came to qualified reports. When it came to the report and one took a span of five years from 2013/14 to 2018/19, DCS had obtained only one unqualified report. That was very concerning. It appeared that the Department was also concerned. It had come up with internal controls workshops but there was no change. There had been an audit plan about audit outcomes but there had been no turnaround. Were the strategies just talk shops and nothing happened, or did implementation happen but it fell short? His colleagues, one after another, had pointed that out in the meeting.

Ms W Newhoudt-Druchen (ANC) noted that 44 female offenders had been trained in hairdressing by DCS and service SETAs. Was that the only training for women? There were lists of programmes for men. Of the 77% Matric pass rate, how many were women? She wanted to know where the community offenders’ offices were and would be happy to wait for a written response. She congratulated the DCS on the increase in restorative justice. Did that number include victims of sexual or gender-based violence and was support given to victims? There had been a newspaper report on overcrowding in the Western Cape correctional facilities. What was the overcrowding rate, in all provinces? Referring to another media item, she asked how a convicted rapist, Mr Ninow, had said that he had had access to drugs in prison. What was DCS doing about that? How many sites providing ARVs were accredited?

Mr Dyantyi welcomed the presentation and thanked the Department for submitting the AR by the end of September. The Committee had read it. Stating the obvious was that the fact that DCS was the last in a queue of role-players protecting society. It went from police arresting criminals to courts to sending people to jail. DCS had to start with people who had been rejected by society and DCS had to deal with them in jail for a long time or with the hope that they should be rehabilitated. The job of DCS was a thankless one, so the team had to appreciate who they were and what they were doing, and see the questions coming from a point where the officials of DCS were appreciated by Members.

Mr Dyantyi referred directly to the Correctional Services AR for 2018/19. He started with the Deputy Minister’s overview where he had focused on the issue of re-offending. That was directly linked to rehabilitation so Mr Dyantyi asked what support was given to people who had been given skills in incarceration. Was there a programme that followed the former inmates and supported them so that they did not re-offend? He appreciated the innovative things such as the bakery project of 3 million loaves of bread at R5 a loaf. That saved a lot money and he was not sure if it had been quantified.

Addressing the National Commissioner, Mr Dyantyi pointed out that colleagues had shared their views on the 5 years’ audits which showed that the DCS was in bad shape. The last two years showed a reduction from 300 plus findings in the previous year to 204 findings in 2018/19. He had to acknowledge the improvement. Could that reduction be fast tracked? Could DCS tell the Committee 10 or 20 things that were outside the control of DCS, e.g. the Department of Public Work was not under DCS control, so that the Committee could monitor effectively. The Commissioner had lamented the lack of qualified senior staff. The Committee needed to know about that.

Mr Dyantyi asked the Commissioner about JICS. JICS had raised a number of challenges when the Deputy Minister was there. JICS had raised a number of challenges but there was an adversarial relationship between JICS and DCS, like IPID and SAPS. How could the relationship be fixed and why did DCS not do things requested by JICS? Mr Dyantyi also asked where the halfway houses were situated. He agreed with Ms Newhoudt-Druchen that the Committee needed that information in writing.

On page 32 in the AR, the Commissioner had made a point that during the following year the DCS would cooperate with the Chief Accountant. When was next year and why not now? What was DCS waiting for? Why not now? He noted that DCS wanted to conduct training on SCM. How long had the people been in SCM? Why did they have to be trained when they had been appointed because they were qualified in SCM. DCS was behaving as if training was the panacea of everything. Why were qualified people being trained to do their job? DCS wanted to conduct due diligence at head office of contracts signed at provincial level, but was that not already happening? If not, why not?

P33 – the gifts received from non-related sports and recreation: Mr Dyantyi asked who had made the donations. A list of donations did not have meaning without an explanation of what the gift was and who had donated. It was very important that the Committee knew who had donated gifts. It did not help if the Committee did not have that information. He wanted the information in writing. He was happy with halfway houses but not halfway measures!

HR p101- the SMS information on 31 March 2019: There were 43 vacant posts, which was a 20% vacancy. There no explanation given beyond the National Treasury moratorium on filling posts. Mr Dyantyi asked if departments just wanted to point out National Treasury’s moratorium.

P106– Mr Dyantyi referred to job evaluation and those jobs that had been upgraded during the period. He was interested in the highly skilled professionals.

P107 - Mr Dyantyi noted that his colleague had raised the matter of personnel vacancies but he wanted to go beyond her questions. The report showed there was 642 appointed but 1 594 people ran away in exodus. If there was no crisis, that was all that he needed to explain it. It was a case of less in and more out. DCS was not the Department of choice.  It explained why staff were leaving but he wanted to go to the disciplinary table which showed a Department at war with itself. There were so many cases of misconduct but only 118 dismissals. What was happening in the Department? DCS could never get stability if the people who were supposed to look after inmates and the department, were involved in misconduct. It was problematic. The table showing utilisation of leave showed that top management used a lot of leave.

P83 and P62: Mr Dyantyi said two targets that DCS had missed because it had come so close to the targets should not be counted as missed targets.

Finances (AR
P135 Legal services: the costs seemed to be very high, considering that the fees went mostly for paying legal fees for actions against their own staff. He wanted a breakdown of legal fees paid showing what the fees were for, e.g. CCMA, court, etc.

P137 – social benefits: all of those issues from municipalities, households, etc showed a significant over-expenditure. 588% over-expenditure, etc. It went to thousands of percentages in some cases. Something had to be horribly wrong. What was happening? The CFO needed to explain that.

P173 – Mr Dyantyi referred to an explanation of variances of R15 billion that had been adjusted. Goods and services were at R6 billion. DCS’s explanation was that it was operating leases and accommodation charges. The interest on land from a zero budget to overspend by R2 million. That was bad planning. He required an explanation.

P 174Transfers and subsidies – post-retirement services: Mr Dyantyi stated that one knew exactly who would be retiring. A department could anticipate retirements. He knew when he would retire based on his age.

Post-retirement expenditure – at what point had the DCS realised that those people would retire. Those were flimsy explanations that were not helpful.

Ms J Mofokeng (ANC) stated that many of her questions had been covered but she was concerned about the criteria for getting into safe houses. Concerning performance agreements, why had five not been signed? She thanked the DCS for giving an education to the young people and ensuring the pass rate, etc. The opening of the school was commendable. She also commended the qualified audit status. She noted the problems of overcrowding but the Minister and the Deputy Minister had to look at that. However, she noted the problem with the Department of Public Works (DPW) which was a problem across departments and said that there had to be a joint meeting with DCS and DPW.

Ms Mofokeng noted that there was no comment on the juveniles. Were they at schools? That was very important. She asked about the challenges experienced in Administration where only 7 out of 11 targets had been achieved. The reasons for the resignation did not give information about what the Department had learned from the exit interviews and what plans it had for retaining staff. Regarding the SMS structure, she wanted to know why there were 73 women and 97 men. When was the Department going to reach the 50% target for women? What about the staff with a disability? No numbers were given for resignations. Had any of those people resigned and, if so, what had their challenges been? She commented on the eight foreigners as workers in DCS. Why employ them? Did they have rare skills? There were SAs who were not working.

Ms Mofokeng noted the number of people who participated in spiritual services. No wonder so many ex-convicts became pastors. Was the number given that of churches and spiritual organisations or was it the number of inmates? It was not clear. How far had the DCS gone in implementing the judgement regarding the transgender inmate? The parole boards at different prisons were in the media. Why did they not operate uniformly? When would DCS give them the information that it needed about the challenges experienced with the way that the parole boards were run? She noted that there had been many complaints that DCS never engaged in public participation and never educated the community on parole boards?

Noting the stakeholders that were working with DCS, she asked how the NGOs were appointed and how many had been appointed? She had received a letter the previous day and would share with the Deputy Minister. The letter indicated that 35 women from Mondeor in Johannesburg wanted to know why they were not considered for parole when wrong people were paroled. The Deputy Minister should address that but she would first share the letter with the Chairperson of the Correctional Services Sub-Committee.  There was legislation about parole but it appeared that some of the people working in parole boards, did not care about the victims. People were only given a short to prepare for parole. Some people knew all about parole and others did not. All SAs needed to know their rights regarding parole. She asked the Deputy Minister about the Bapoo judgement.

Ms Newhoudt-Druchen had remembered her last question. She noted that on slide 54 on vacancies, if she took the total divided by the vacancies, she came to 10.76 % but the average indicated on the slide was 5%. How was the average worked out?

The Acting Chairperson had a few questions and indicated that the answers could be supplied in writing. He asked for an update on the investigation by the SIU on the five proclamations. He also had a serious concern regarding compliance by DCS with competitive bidding processes in cases where contracts were beyond R500 000.  What was the situation there?

The Acting Chairperson thanked the Commission and the Deputy Minister and called for a brief break in proceedings.

Responses by DCS
The National Commissioner informed the Acting Chairperson that that his staff would respond to the questions. If there was anything not answered at the end, he would address those questions.

Incarceration
Ms Vuyi Mlomo-Ndlovu, Acting Chief Deputy Commissioner: Remand Operations Management, DCS, stated that there were three categories of mentally ill patients. Critically ill or mentally patients were sent to a psychiatrist as it was difficult to keep mentally ill patients without their having treatment. DCS had observation cases and in those cases it referred the inmate to the relevant hospitals but there was nothing DCS could do while that person was on a waiting list. State patients were the outcome of the observation cases. Timeframes were not always clear, although DCS should have such patients only for a short time. The law said that there should be 14 days from when the court referred the person to the Department of Health (DoH) and then there were 14 days which DoH should utilise to place the patient, but there was a shortage of state hospital beds so the DoH visited inmates while they were still in correctional services. The shortage was particularly bad in Eastern Cape where patients were being visited by psychiatrists while still in correctional service facilities. Severely mentally ill persons who were DCS inmates could be referred to the mental establishments but after stabilisation, they were sent back to DCS.

Ms Mlomo-Ndlovu explained that the pastoral care figures in the AR referred to the number of inmates who participated in individual care sessions offered by full-time care DCS staff and registered service providers from churches that were registered with DCS. The statistics were based on all services rendered.

She added that all AVR sites were all accredited.

Security
Mr Lucky Mthethwa, Chief Security Officer, DCS, responded to the question regarding the discrepancy between DCS and JICS statistics (58 versus 103) in respect of unnatural deaths. JICS reported on all reported deaths. DCS reported only on those confirmed by medical practitioners as unnatural. There would be no similarity in numbers. There were preventive measures to deal with the issue. The Assault Preventative Plan was being implemented in all facilities and where it was not implemented, there were consequence measures.

Mr Mthethwa stated that the target regarding escapes had been achieved. There had been 56 escapes and there had been a re-arrest of 44 of the escapees. It was an increase of six escapes from 2017/18 to 2018/19 because of the mass escape of the remandees in Johannesburg. The reasons for the escapes had been staff not complying and an element of corrupt activities. People had been arrested and consequence management had been implemented. DCS had a plan to enforce policies and procedures regarding security and encouraged surprise visits by management and the security committees established as required by legislation in all Department. DCS had diagnosed the problems and had come up with preventative measures and, in so doing, had achieved the target.

On drugs, he explained that one drug entering the facilities was one too many. It was not accepted. If it happened, it meant that the authority of the state was being diminished so DCS had a plan to keep up with the attempts to smuggle in drugs in line with the changing environment which was brought about by, among other things, the 4th Industrial Revolution. DCS had identified emergency security teams to assist in searches and actively participated with other government services involved in rooting out illegal substances. That had produced good results. He could not report on the details because the matter was sub judice and some DCS members were involved. A team was working with other institutions in trying to come up with a masterplan regarding contraband and security. One of the grey areas was the lack of security personnel and DCS was working on a new security model as it was one of the pillars of DCS. The Department was working closely with JCSP cluster to address security concerns and other organisations such as CSIR.

CDC Katenga responded to the calculation of the vacancy rate. It was based on the staff complement of 41 463. 38 344 posts were filled which equalled 92.5% of the establishment. Taking that figure from 100% gave one a 7.5% vacancy rate. He also responded to the question on therapeutic diets on page 83 where the planned target was 12% and the actual achievement was just over. DCS did not want to exceed 12%

Human Resources
Mr Moeketsi Mashibini, CDC for Human Resources, DCS, responded to the issue of foreign workers. They were usually spiritual workers employed on a month-to-month to render religious care. In respect of discipline, the AR shows 118 dismissals. Mr Dyantyi had commented that the Department was fighting with itself. On page 122 of the AR indicates the different types of misconduct. 34 officials were charged for using property of state without permission, e.g. officials who were renting out their houses and pocketing the money. That was serious. Assaulting offenders and colleagues and sleeping on duty were serious offences as they threatened the safety of their own colleagues in the operating environment. DCS had to take strict measures. Resolution 1 of 2002 for non-SMS members and the SMS conduct handbook regulated the statutory conditions. In both, serious versus non-serious conduct offences were identified. Non-serious offences could be addressed with written warnings, etc. but serious offences resulted in people being dismissed from the Service.

He explained the process of job evaluation which upgraded officials using the tool provided by the Public Service and Administration. It was important for the retention of members. Especially in SCM, people in those areas were employed at a higher level in other departments and so the people were moving to other departments because they were appointed at higher levels and paid more for the same work. Hence the upgrading of posts to levels comparable with other departments.

Mr Mashibini explained that the vacancy rate was an historical problem. When he had assumed the portfolio, he had seen how high the vacancy rate was and he had gone back through the ARs from 2013/14 and found that there had been a high vacancy rate each year.  DCS had needed to understand the problem before attempting to remedy the situation. One challenge that he had found in filling critical posts was that the appointment processes were centralised at head office because of section 96(3) of the Act which provided that all appointments above Director level had to take place in conjunction with the Minister and the Head of Department. That meant that no one from the regions could make appointments from the level of a Director and above. The DCS would be recommending the decentralisation of the appointment process. Currently, the selection panel had to include the Minister or Deputy Minister and high level appointments such as the Head of Department and Regional Heads and they were never available. The Division had decided to indicate in the appointment letter to the panel that the process had to be finalised by a particular date. In addition, shortlisted candidates often had excuses for not attending and so the panel had to be re-scheduled for one person to be interviewed and it was a struggle to get the panel back again. It was said to be a strategy of some candidates so that they could get questions from other candidates before they were interviewed. They were investigating the truth of that information but currently DCS was requiring a letter from the doctor for an absence from an interview.

He added that another problem was the disappearance of appointment submissions. When people were not happy with an appointment, the entire file with all the certificates and information disappeared. Now, the policy was that there had to be copies of submissions and certificates. He had investigated and had held officials accountable for that practice. Another challenge was that some senior managers participated in several interview processes. When that person did their job, he did not know, but such a person delayed other processes. One was now allowed to participate in no more than two interview panels at a time. DCS also had to rely on the assistance of experts for certain posts and so people from other departments were requested to assist on the panels. That also delayed interviews.

Mr Mashibini added that intermittent and unscheduled advertising of posts had not made the process any easier. DCS now had one recruitment drive in a year so that all candidates could move through the selection process at the same time. The CDC posts would be advertised this coming weekend. The posts had been kept together. Of the 31 posts advertised, 18 were for shortlisting and 10 candidates had been moved horizontally into the posts. DCS would fill 30 SMS posts by the end of December 2019.

In responding to questions on exit interview, he stated that the Department had learned about the reasons why people left. 425 had resigned. Mr Mashibini had called them and asked them to reconsider the position but the people were looking for better salaries. They just wanted to get more money because they were heavily indebted. Others wanted transfers to the departments that offered better conditions. He had tried but it was difficult to change someone’s mind.

Officials who did not signing the performance agreement were sent a non-performance letter. The Department made the person aware that he or she would not benefit from any pay progression or bonuses as a result of not signing the letter. To make sure everyone was aware of the issue, DCS would be conducting workshops where all senior members in the Department would be taken through the performance agreement so that employees could understand why they would not enjoy benefits. The Department was also considering consequence management.

He pointed out that it was not only senior managers who were frequently sick but it was also junior managers and members on the ground. Years ago, HR practitioners used to visit the person to see if he or she was in the bed. They also questioned the doctor. But that was now outside the ambit of the law and the employer could not ask why a person was booked off by a medical practitioner.

Mr Mashibini agreed that not much had been done about equity. However, the current process was intended to address that problem. Only under extreme circumstances, would DCS not reach the target. 0.7% of the employees were disabled but the DCS would engage relevant institutions to encourage physically disabled persons to apply for positions. He added that some facilities were not disability friendly.

IT Management
Nthabiseng Msupye stated that the service provider for the IIMS had been paid on deliverables and so had not been paid in full.

Court Judgement
Ms Mlomo-Ndlovu responded to the query about the Phaahla judgement which had given DCS 24 months to make changes in the Correctional Services Act but DCS had had to implement the judgement immediately. A circular had been sent out on 30 May 2019 explaining all the processes to identify all offenders who had to be reviewed to comply with the Phaahla judgement. 50 inmates had benefitted. The National Commissioner had decided to appoint a task team to manage the changes to the Act. The Bill process was very long but the official would make proposed amendments and send it through all the relevant structures to get the Bill to Parliament. A delay was caused by contemplation as to whether those changes should be included in the review that DCS was undertaking of the entire Act. However, as the timeframe was only 24 months, DCS had made the decision to amend the current Act in order to meet the deadline.

Adv Breytenbach asked if DCS would make it within the 24 months.

Facilities
Dr Botha responded to questions on bed spaces. The 12 bed spaces in C-Max project had been finalised in the previous year and DCS had received the occupancy certificate. In terms of bed spaces, DCS was challenged, which was why the task team had been appointed to look at bed spaces. The initial increase of 12 bed spaces, although the project had been to transform the facility from a prison to a correctional centre and bed spaces had been a spin-off. The project had been delayed but a great achievement was the fact that the facility was totally off the grid when it came to hot water, thanks to the solar system. The Department embraced technology and would use that as a model for other centres.

The Standerton facility had been delayed due to water shedding because of the drought and the municipality had cut off the water supply for construction work. However, the facility had been opened in May 2019. Glencoe was a refurbishment project as a result of which 660 bed spaces were regained at the end of June 2019. DCS had received the occupancy and construction certificates. The Parys site was handed over to the contractor in February 2019. It was one of the projects given to the Development Bank of Southern Africa (DBSA) because DPW was so slow. DCS did not want to sit around and then come to the Committee and complain about DPW as DCS was responsible for the facility. The contractor was making good progress. DCS had signed a Memorandum of Agreement with the DBSA for several projects because of challenges with DPW.

Responding to the question on the costs of the Tzaneen facility, Dr Botha reminded the Committee that the contractor had been liquidated but added that the majority of the costs of the new contractor would be paid from a suspension account into which funds for the penalty clauses had been paid. It had been a challenging site since the contractor had been liquidated. There had been theft of cables during the break from construction and the previous contractor had taken some shortcuts that had had to be addressed. Weekly project meetings were held on site. The envisaged hand-over date was the end of November 2019. As soon as a Department had an expansion of over 20% or R2 million on a construction project, it had to get a Variation Order from National Treasury as per the National Treasury Note. Waiting for National Treasury approval had caused further delays.

The Burgersdorp facility was a new centre in the Eastern Cape with 311 bed spaces. Plans had been finalised and the tender would go out for a contractor before the end of the year and the intention was to start on the first day of the 2020/21 financial year. With the Lichtenburg facility, the environmental assessment report was outstanding from the local municipality but DCS had recruited a professional team to work on the project and it was anticipated that the tender would go out before the end of December so that that the contractor could also start on the first day of the 2020/21 financial year.

Regarding the allegations of overcrowding in the Western Cape, Dr Botha explained that DCS was planning to renovate an old, decommissioned centre at Brandvlei which would give 690 bed spaces in an area where they were needed. Consultants were currently being appointed.

Finance
Mr Ligege, said that there were three cases of irregular or fruitless and wasteful expenditure which related to family members being involved. There had not been any investigations as there was not a dedicated investigating unit that dealt with irregular expenditure but the Department had resuscitated a Chief Directorate called Internal Control and Compliance. It was consolidated with the Chief Directorate for Risk Management, although those inspectors also had other work to do to do with service evaluation of management and regions.

He informed the Committee that the conflict of interest had come about when the AG ran the Computer-Assisted Audit Techniques (CATT) system in which the AG linked data across the organs of state and found 154 cases of possible conflict of interest. DCS did the investigations to find evidence of misconduct and had come up with 28 cases out of the 154 where it found officials of other departments were doing work with DCS. DCS could only access the employee records of government departments. Those cases were being referred to their employers. There had been 36 cases in which officials had resigned or were deceased and the cases had to be closed. There were 13 cases where officials were found not to be working for the Public Service. 49 cases found some conflict by officials of DCS and those had been to their area supervisors or directors who had to do consequence management by 30 October 2019. 38 cases were still being investigated. It was hoped that all cases would be closed by March 2020.

Mr Ligege explained that the irregular expenditure and fruitless and wasteful expenditure cases were being investigated but the DCS had been previously been unable to reconcile national and provincial records as it had not had a database. In the 2018/19 AR, DCS had explained that 80% of the irregularities could be attributed to three cases: Independent Development Trust (IDT) amounting to R1,816 million, the Nutrition contract at R707 million (since concluded), and one was a contract with the Department of Higher Education from 2014. The three cases could not be concluded until all investigations were complete. Together the amount was R2.7 billion. Other cases were being investigated. DCS had concluded 750 out 875 cases in respect of irregular expenditure, and 146 cases out of 249 cases of fruitless and wasteful expenditure.

The New Framework required all those cases be sent to the National Treasury Chief Procurement Office as National Treasury wanted to take away the responsibility from Accounting Officers. CDC Ligege added that in the Forum of CFOs, a concern had been raised that National Treasury might not have the capacity to manage all the cases that would come through.

Responding to Mr Dyantyi’s concerns about the strategic management only being done in the following year, Mr Ligege explained that the report was referring to the 2019/20 financial year and the Department would have the first round of contracts ready by the end of June 2020. The changes of the SCM prescripts had taught DCS that there had to be continuous training. For example, there were new procurement rules regarding designated groups and people had to be trained in the new rules. Bid reviews had been taking place since 2016 and irregular expenditure had been prevented but the tenders had been stopped and that meant that there were no contracts for food and hygiene so those items had been bought on quotation but, because a contract ought to have been in place, everything spent over the time without a contract had to be added up and then that had exceeded the relevant authority. Combatting one form of irregular expenditure had led to another. He would provide details regarding gifts in writing.

The legal case expenditure was mainly related to motions regarding parole. The post-retirement benefits related to medical aid payments to GEMS. Some retirees received 100% funding of their medical aid. Payment of such funds used to be under CoE budget but that expenditure was no longer under CoE but had to be placed under Household. When the budget had been appropriated by Parliament, the budget for those post-retirement benefits had been in the wrong place. CDC Ligege stated that DCS was waiting the approval of Parliament in order to align the expenditure.

Mr Ligege responded to Adv Breytenbach’s question about the write-offs of the Integrated Justice System (IJS). DCS participated in the Department of Justice IJS programme through its IIMS programme. The process of claiming funds meant one spent the funds, raised a debtor and invoiced the DoJ&CD. However, because IIMS had been found to be non-compliant as it was not procured through the State Information Technology Agency (SITA), DoJ&CD could not pay against those invoices until IIMS was cleared by SITA. The debt had been raised in 2015/16. The funding was impaired and therefore was written off.

He added that entertainment expenditure related to entertainment by the Ministry when it had engagements with stakeholders.

Conclusion
The Acting Chairperson asked for the remaining answers in writing as there was a House sitting that afternoon.

The National Commissioner agreed that he would respond in writing. He thanked the Acting Chairperson and the Committee for the frank engagement. He acknowledged Mr Dyantyi’s remarks and said that it was important for his staff that they heard that their work was appreciated because some of the people at the coal face had a thankless task. DCS was a huge institution and should not be underestimated. He took full responsibility but it was going to take time to get the DCS aligned to the service model and get greater alignment. The Department wanted assess the impact. They did not work in a vacuum as they were at the front end of the social cluster. He looked forward to further engagement.

The Deputy Minister commented on the question of JICS. The matter was dealt with by the National Commissioner and the Judge and the matter was taken to DPSA. The National Commissioner had to appoint officials but JICS had to be seen to be independent. Regarding assistance to offenders, one could only do so much: receive offenders, try to rehabilitate them and give them skills and then release them. Thereafter, it was the responsibility of the community and other departments to ensure that the skills were used. It was not illegal to employ a person with a criminal record but they had to declare what kind of life they had had. For example, when asked where they had obtained their qualifications, they would have to reveal that it was in correctional services. The Minister had instructed him to work very closely with the Department.

The Acting Chairperson asked if seven days would be sufficient for the responses from DCS.

The National Commissioner agreed to the deadline.

Mr Dyantyi asked the Chairperson to inform DCS about the Sub-Committee on Correctional Services.

The Acting Chairperson informed DCS that the Sub-Committee on Correctional Services would deal with many of the matters but something like an AR would not be delegated to the Sub-Committee.

The meeting was adjourned.

 

Meeting report

Election of Acting Chairperson
The Committee Secretary, Mr Vhonani Ramaano, opened the meeting and welcomed the Members.

He presented apologies from the Chairperson, who was, unfortunately, engaged in a meeting on Chapter Nine Institutions. The Secretary called for nominations, explaining that if more than one person was nominated, he would call for a vote. Adv H Mohammed (ANC) was nominated unopposed.

Opening remarks
The Acting Chairperson thanked Members for their confidence in him and reminded them that the Chairperson had tendered an apology. He also noted an apology from the Minister of Justice and Correctional Services, Mr Ronald Lamola, who was attending a strategic planning session of the Department of Justice and Constitutional Development. He noted that the Deputy Minister, Nkosi Phathekile Holomisa, would be arriving shortly. He welcomed the delegation from the Department of Correctional Services (DCS), especially the National Commissioner who would present the 2018/19 Annual Report and the successes, challenges and more particularly the goals of 2018/19. He was looking forward to the report.

Briefing by the Department of Correctional Services (DCS)
Mr Arthur Fraser, National Commissioner, DCS, stated that the Deputy Minister had intended to present the introduction but he would be joining the meeting soon, having been held up by air traffic.

The Commissioner said that in the year under review the organisation had achieved 82% of all targets set. DCS had achieved 100% of the Rehabilitation and Care targets which were at the centre of the rehabilitation and care process. The skills development programmes were critical. DCS had put in place certain interventions, such as a single operational centre and reviewing the current structures.

The Chairperson welcomed the Deputy Minister, Nkosi Holomisa.

The Deputy Minister thanked the Committee for the opportunity to present the Annual Report for 2018/19. On a number of areas, targets had been achieved but in others, the Department had fallen short and needed to pay better attention to areas highlighted by the Auditor-General (AG).

The Deputy Minister was pleased that DCS had opened a new high school named Tari Liswa (New Leaf) for Grade 10 to 12 learners. The Cradock Correctional Centre School had been opened. The Department wanted all young inmates to complete a Senior Certificate or at least complete Grade 9 or Adult Basic Education and Training Level 4.

Aimed at maintaining the wellbeing of inmates in its custody, the Department had provided a comprehensive package of healthcare services and programmes to inmates which included primary health care, nutrition, hygiene and pharmaceutical services. Approximately 99% of those tested positive for HIV had been put on medication.
                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                       
The Deputy Minister added that the Department would prioritise its ongoing engagement with the community in the current year and pay attention to irregular and fruitless and wasteful expenditure. In conclusion, he                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                        thanked Members of the Committee for their continued support and guidance.

The Acting Chairperson thanked the Deputy Minister and asked the National Commissioner to present the report on the R23.8 billion budget of DCS.

DCS Annual Report 2018/19
The National Commissioner handed over to the, Chief Deputy Commissioner for Strategic Management, Mr Joseph Katenga, to present the Annual Report for 2018/19.

Safety and Security at correctional facilities
Mr Katenga informed the Committee that overcrowding, staff shortages and aging infrastructure were significant contributing factors to security incidents at correctional facilities but the intensification of management supervision had led to a decrease in the number of reported cases of assault of inmates. 24 attempted escapes had been foiled and 164 attempted suicides were prevented during the 2018/19 financial year. The total inmate population in 2018/19 was 162 875, down from 164 129 in 2017/18. In 2018/19, there had been 54 935 parolees, 15 251 probationers and 1 387 awaiting trial persons.

The Department had a post establishment of 41 463 as at March 2019 with 3 119 vacant positions as a result of the ceiling on compensation of employees (CoE) budget imposed by National Treasury. Of the 38 annual targets, 31 had been achieved. Administration and Incarceration targets had not been reached and one social integration target had not been reached. The targets not achieved included:
- completion of the Integrated Inmate Management System (IIMS)
- an audit without qualifications
- the number of unnatural deaths
- the number of new bed spaces created
- the number of parolees and probationers reintegrated into communities through halfway houses.

The Acting Chairperson asked DCS to focus on the challenges and to explain why indicators had not been met.

Mr Q Dyantyi (ANC) indicated that Members had read the report and would rather spend more time engaging with the Department.

Ms Nthabiseng Mosupye, Government Information Technical Officer, DCS, explained that the IIMS for core business processes had been delayed because officials found use of the system overwhelming and the facial recognition and fingerprints capability could not be completed on time. The Department was being assisted by a service provider whose contract had been extended by one year. The DCS staff were being trained to manage and enhance the system in the future and there were no additional costs to the Department for the extension of the contract.

Dr Riaan Botha, Acting Deputy Commissioner: Facilities, explained that the intention had been to create additional bed spaces through new construction of correctional centres and upgrade projects:
-C-Max project for 12 beds had been completed in 2018.
-Escort facility was completed after the end of the financial year in May 2019.
-Standerton facility was also finalised in the new financial year, i.e. in May 2019.
-New facilities in Tzaneen targeted for 2018/19 had not been completed. It was currently 99% complete after the contractor had been liquidated and the new contractor promised completion in November 2019.

Dr Botha explained that, in the past, DCS could not update the bed space figures which were moving targets as cells became dilapidated or were re-commissioned because the Department had used a paper system to update the figures. However, DCS was now auditing all bed spaces, re-measuring all cells and calculating actual bed spaces. 220 out of 243 institutions had been completed and captured on the IT system.

The Acting Chairperson asked if penalties had applied when contracts were changed and whether the deviations were authorised.

Mr Dyantyi asked that the Acting Chairperson hold back on the questions and the detail and allow DCS to run through the presentation.

The Acting Chairperson said that he had asked DCS only to zoom into targets not achieved.

Ms N Maseko-Jele (ANC) suggested that the DCS should proceed and complete the presentation.

Fraud and corruption
Mr Katenga informed the Committee that 218 incidents had been reported; a total of 609 cases and 342 enquiries had been brought forward from previous years. 1 777 investigations had been finalised, in 34 cases prima facie evidence of misconduct had been found and disciplinary proceedings were initiated. 32 disciplinary hearings had found 31 officials guilty.

Financial matters
Mr Nick Ligege,CFO, DCS, stated that DCS had received a qualified audit but the number of findings had steadily decreased from 588 findings in 2014/15 to 204 findings in 2018/19. Many of the 2018/19 findings related to commitments and irregular expenditure. DCS had a total budget R23.85 billion and an underspend of R72 million.

There had been an issue with AGSA as the auditors had wanted reports on the work done by the Department of Public Works but that would have created a system of double reporting. The AG’s position had been modified.

Causes of Negative Audit Outcomes
The supply chain management (SCM) had been faced with changing prescripts and complex accounting standards in addition to the challenge of vacancies due to budget cuts. There had been a lack of capacity within SCM and the Finance Unit. The high dependency on manual processes to generate information and reports had resulted in a high error rate. DCS had also encountered the problem of a lack of understanding of Modified Cash Standards (MCS) of Reporting by non-financial managers and that had resulted in incomplete, inaccurate reporting and non-compliance with MCS. There had been constant changes and an unclear supply management regulatory environment with many directives from National Treasury.

Measures taken to address audit outcomes
The Department had developed an Audit Outcomes Turnaround Plan that required: training and capacitation of SCM and Financial Management components, automation of processes for performance information, SCM and Finance, and a review of Governance structures and policies.

DCS would conduct internal control workshops and indabas to enhance understanding of regulatory environment and improve internal control maturity, maintain audit files for all work done to improve controls.
Measures would be undertaken to address audit outcomes including the finalisation of the investigations of irregular, fruitless and wasteful expenditure. The Department would also review the entire population of commitments and irregular expenditure to ensure complete and accurate disclosures.

Discussion
Adv G Breytenbach (DA) noted that the most common type of misconduct was absenteeism or repeated absenteeism from work without a valid reason or permission with 1 271 cases; dereliction of duties with 586 cases and breaching of security measures with 329 cases. What had been the outcome of the disciplinary hearings? What was a typical sanction? Four people had been given a final written warning for corruption. What sort of corruption had it been and was that a typical sanction?

Adv Breytenbach noted that the shortage of bed space was currently at 37% and yet not one bed space had been created in the year. Zero out of a target of 435. Twelves bed spaces were created at C-Max during upgrades but could not be verified by the AG. What was the percentage overcrowding in C-Max? Could DCS explain the complete failure in that area?

Adv Breytenbach asked about the 58 unnatural deaths in 2018/19. It was way too many. What were the causes? The Judicial Inspectorate for Correctional Services (JICS) suggested that the figure was 103 unnatural deaths. Could DCS explain the discrepancy? Why had there been an increase to 56 escapes? Why had there been an increase? How many had been re-arrested? What crimes had they been in for? What had been done to address the particular issue? Were any charges instituted against staff members, and, if so, what were the outcomes and sanction? Regarding inmates with mental illnesses, what was the plan to deal with that? What was being done to assist those inmates? 100% of the budget for that area had been spent but only 66% of the target had been reached. Could DCS explain the discrepancy?

Regarding various sums written off, Adv Breytenbach asked if DCS could explain why R76.9 million was written off as other material losses. What did that mean? R68.23 million was written off as loss on Integrated Justice System. Could DCS explain what that meant? The AG had expressed concern about a lack of consequence management. How would that be dealt with? The entertainment budget had tripled. What entertainment did the budget pay for? Rehabilitation, including salary, was at 7% of the annual budget. That made a mockery of the rehabilitation as a strategic goal and meant that DCS was just providing a very expensive warehousing service. How did the Department intend to deal with that matter? It was an ongoing issue and raised every year.

Adv Breytenbach noted that responses from the previous meeting had not been submitted. When could the Committee look forward to receiving those responses? DCS had agreed to supply information regarding the implementation of the Phaahla judgement. Could DCS provide the Committee with the information as Members were unable to respond to queries in that regard. DCS spoke of danger zones where it was not able to monitor parolees. The Committee had not received the update. What was the current position?
She had directed an enquiry regarding a proposed parole to a Mr Smalberger whose immediate response had been that he had forwarded the question to the Division dealing with Incarceration and stated that the Acting DCS head of Incarceration would handle it. That was in early September. She had received no response or acknowledgement from that Division despite the email being sent to several officials. Why? If she was having that much difficulty in getting a response, how difficult was it for anyone else?

Mr W Horn (DA) said, bearing in mind that the National Commissioner had taken office just after the beginning of the financial year under discussion and he had assured the then Committee that he had already been appraised of all the challenges, both the audit outcome and the performance report was very worrying. He noted the CFO’s comment that the number of findings had come down but the AG had told the Committee that there had been a regression in terms of financial and other reporting. He asked the National Commissioner about the system of colours of green, yellow and red. The AG had said that there was a regression in terms of assurances on the part of the Executive Authority. That meant that the National Commissioner had not been available when they had wanted to raise issues with him and when they did meet with him, there had been a non-committal approach regarding issues that had to be addressed immediately or it would affect the audit outcomes. The rest was history. What was the National Commissioner going to do about it and what should the Committee conclude regarding that issue?

Mr Horn said that the National Commissioner, in his address to the Committee, had talked about a review of corporate governance structures. What was the outcome of the review? The AG also pointed out that there had been five acting Chief Deputy Commissioners (CDCs) during the year. That created instability as acting people did not take tough decisions. What was the position? When would there be permanent appointments? Consequence management was raised as a concern by the AG. In respect of irregular expenditure, none of the 198 incidents had been investigated. That was unacceptable, especially if the DCS was embracing the fight against corruption. He was not saying that all irregular expenditure was corrupt but the saying was that it was a likely place to start. DCS did not know what new corruption had taken place over last two years, or they did not care. Given the problems of Bosasa, he believed that the Committee should determine a specific timetable in respect of what DCS should report to the Committee in respect of the investigations into irregular expenditure. Fruitless and wasteful expenditure was scarcely any better with only three instances out of nearly 60 having been investigated.

Concerning bed spaces, Mr Horn admitted that a lot had already been asked but the DCS was making the new Minister a liar. In July, he had told South Africa that Tzaneen and Glencoe would be handed over by September 2019. Both institutions had a history of long delays. Now Mr Horn believed it would be handed over in November 2019. On the situation in Glencoe, there was complete silence. What was the situation in Glencoe? The Minister had also told the Committee in July that there would be site hand-overs in that financial year in Parys, Lichtenburg and Burgersdorp.

Regarding the Integrated Inmate Management System (IIMS), he repeated himself each time DCS presented a report: he did not believe that the Committee could place any reliance on reports on the IIMS. None of the targets had been met. The Chief Procurement Officer had advised cancellation of the contract owing to the lack of capacity of the service provider, and now officials were being blamed. A proper bid specification would have included the timely training of officials. The contract had been extended until the following year. Had the contractor been paid the full amount? If so, nothing would happen. At what stage did DCS cut its losses. The Bosasa contract had finally been cancelled without the skies falling. Had the issue of Bosasa not taught the Department anything? It was clear that IIMS was not progressing.

Mr Horn asked what processes or procedures were in place for establishing halfway houses. He was asking because of an experience in Bloemfontein where there had been a huge public outcry regarding the opening of a halfway house in a suburb without notification. The point was the comment of the owner of that house. The owner was not worried because she had been asked to procure a property for a halfway house by the ANC Secretary-General, Ace Magashule. Was there a transparent process for procuring halfway houses? What audit processes were there for where and how halfway houses were established?

Noting that the Minister had said that he would be at the meeting, but was not, Mr Horn hoped that the Deputy Minister could answer his question about the instance at which the Judicial Inspectorate had expressed amazement and a worry about filling positions in the Directorate for Support Services. The Deputy Minister was there at the time. JICS had been concerned about the refusal of the Department to open up the personnel management IT system, Persal, to finalise the appointment. Of a bigger concern, was the fact that the refusal was based on the fact that the National Commissioner and the Minister had ordered them via a letter to appoint someone who was not the preferred candidate. That should be a concern to the Committee. JICS, by its nature, had to be independent. How could they order JICS to appoint a person? He wanted to hear from the National Commissioner and the ministry how they could justify their actions.
 
Ms Maseko-Jele acknowledged the presence of the Deputy Minister. On slide 63 which dealt with the compensation of employees, the actual expenditure of R15.8 billion was 93.8% against an adjusted budget of R16.9 billion. She was looking at the amount spent on compensation of employees. She noted that of 175 senior management officials, only 170 members had signed performance agreements. What steps had been taken against those not signed? How many members had signed Performance Agreements in the current year? Why was the number of appointees so much lower than the number of people who had left the Department? DCS had had eight foreigners in the Department in April 2018 but at the end of March 2019, there were only seven. Why was DCS employing foreigners? Was it for specialist work? She required clarity.

On misconduct, Ms Maseko-Jele noted that repeated absence from work without leave was the most reported misconduct. 586 employees had been charged with dereliction of duty and 329 charged with breach of security measures. It was disturbing because DCS was a security environment. The Department spent so much money on personnel but that was what it produced. The Department had to start on a new footing in the new year. Most of the officials had been in the Department for quite some time and maybe when the Minister’s term of office ended, they would find themselves in the same position. She asked that DCS helped the Committee to help the Department.

On the report of the AG, Ms Maseko-Jele was glad that the Deputy Chairperson of the Internal Audit Committee was in attendance. The AG had said that the Committee had to do some work in its oversight. She had read his recommendations. The recommendation for DCS included designing an action plan and follow up on it, fill key vacancies, and put in place measures to curb irregular expenditure. She was sure that the DCS had put some things in place but she referred DCS to the AR, which she said the Committee should go through in detail with the Department to correct things, where the report talked about the top five areas of non-compliance: management of procurement and contracts, quality of financial statements, management of irregular and fruitless and wasteful expenditure, implementation of an action plan to manage performance, consequence management of officials. She was asking questions that her colleagues had asked because DCS needed to take care of those things, otherwise the Committee would be very harsh on the Department.

Ms Maseko-Jele turned to the report on fraud and corruption. Her colleagues had also referred to the issue. No fraud was identified in 2017/18 but in 2018/19, 36 possible cases of fraud were identified and were being investigated. She wanted a report on those. Mr Horn had mentioned the colours used by the AG to show progress. She asked the DCS to get those colours. A number of issues were yellow. Proper recording was not done There were no daily or monthly controls. That had to improve. Officials had to do something every day that they came to work. The audit committee had to check things monthly so that the managers could correct those things before the AG came. The Audit Committee was red in terms of governance. Risk management was red. DCS wanted to request permission from Parliament regarding the costs incurred in 2012/13. Exactly what was it that they wanted the Committee to do?

Ms Maseko-Jele said that she had received a good report on some of the criminals working in the community but they had complained that on their ID, they had an asterisk which showed that they were criminals and so everyone knew they were criminals. They were doing well in the programmes, so why could the asterisk not be removed? However, she did think it was a deterrent to young people. Could the Commissioner tell her how she was supposed to answer questions about the asterisk?

The Acting Chairperson reminded Members that there was to be a three-line whip that afternoon. Although Members could have all the time that they wanted as that was permissible, they had to remember that there were others.

Prof C Msimang (IFP) was largely covered by his colleagues. He would focus on Part E: Financial Matters. He would emphasise his concerns alongside those of his colleagues that had just spoken. Although the Committee was excited about clean audits, it was used to unqualified audits with findings but it was eyebrow raising when it came to qualified reports. When it came to the report and one took a span of five years from 2013/14 to 2018/19, DCS had obtained only one unqualified report. That was very concerning. It appeared that the Department was also concerned. It had come up with internal controls workshops but there was no change. There had been an audit plan about audit outcomes but there had been no turnaround. Were the strategies just talk shops and nothing happened, or did implementation happen but it fell short? His colleagues, one after another, had pointed that out in the meeting.

Ms W Newhoudt-Druchen (ANC) noted that 44 female offenders had been trained in hairdressing by DCS and service SETAs. Was that the only training for women? There were lists of programmes for men. Of the 77% Matric pass rate, how many were women? She wanted to know where the community offenders’ offices were and would be happy to wait for a written response. She congratulated the DCS on the increase in restorative justice. Did that number include victims of sexual or gender-based violence and was support given to victims? There had been a newspaper report on overcrowding in the Western Cape correctional facilities. What was the overcrowding rate, in all provinces? Referring to another media item, she asked how a convicted rapist, Mr Ninow, had said that he had had access to drugs in prison. What was DCS doing about that? How many sites providing ARVs were accredited?

Mr Dyantyi welcomed the presentation and thanked the Department for submitting the AR by the end of September. The Committee had read it. Stating the obvious was that the fact that DCS was the last in a queue of role-players protecting society. It went from police arresting criminals to courts to sending people to jail. DCS had to start with people who had been rejected by society and DCS had to deal with them in jail for a long time or with the hope that they should be rehabilitated. The job of DCS was a thankless one, so the team had to appreciate who they were and what they were doing, and see the questions coming from a point where the officials of DCS were appreciated by Members.

Mr Dyantyi referred directly to the Correctional Services AR for 2018/19. He started with the Deputy Minister’s overview where he had focused on the issue of re-offending. That was directly linked to rehabilitation so Mr Dyantyi asked what support was given to people who had been given skills in incarceration. Was there a programme that followed the former inmates and supported them so that they did not re-offend? He appreciated the innovative things such as the bakery project of 3 million loaves of bread at R5 a loaf. That saved a lot money and he was not sure if it had been quantified.

Addressing the National Commissioner, Mr Dyantyi pointed out that colleagues had shared their views on the 5 years’ audits which showed that the DCS was in bad shape. The last two years showed a reduction from 300 plus findings in the previous year to 204 findings in 2018/19. He had to acknowledge the improvement. Could that reduction be fast tracked? Could DCS tell the Committee 10 or 20 things that were outside the control of DCS, e.g. the Department of Public Work was not under DCS control, so that the Committee could monitor effectively. The Commissioner had lamented the lack of qualified senior staff. The Committee needed to know about that.

Mr Dyantyi asked the Commissioner about JICS. JICS had raised a number of challenges when the Deputy Minister was there. JICS had raised a number of challenges but there was an adversarial relationship between JICS and DCS, like IPID and SAPS. How could the relationship be fixed and why did DCS not do things requested by JICS? Mr Dyantyi also asked where the halfway houses were situated. He agreed with Ms Newhoudt-Druchen that the Committee needed that information in writing.

On page 32 in the AR, the Commissioner had made a point that during the following year the DCS would cooperate with the Chief Accountant. When was next year and why not now? What was DCS waiting for? Why not now? He noted that DCS wanted to conduct training on SCM. How long had the people been in SCM? Why did they have to be trained when they had been appointed because they were qualified in SCM. DCS was behaving as if training was the panacea of everything. Why were qualified people being trained to do their job? DCS wanted to conduct due diligence at head office of contracts signed at provincial level, but was that not already happening? If not, why not?

P33 – the gifts received from non-related sports and recreation: Mr Dyantyi asked who had made the donations. A list of donations did not have meaning without an explanation of what the gift was and who had donated. It was very important that the Committee knew who had donated gifts. It did not help if the Committee did not have that information. He wanted the information in writing. He was happy with halfway houses but not halfway measures!

HR p101- the SMS information on 31 March 2019: There were 43 vacant posts, which was a 20% vacancy. There no explanation given beyond the National Treasury moratorium on filling posts. Mr Dyantyi asked if departments just wanted to point out National Treasury’s moratorium.

P106– Mr Dyantyi referred to job evaluation and those jobs that had been upgraded during the period. He was interested in the highly skilled professionals.

P107 - Mr Dyantyi noted that his colleague had raised the matter of personnel vacancies but he wanted to go beyond her questions. The report showed there was 642 appointed but 1 594 people ran away in exodus. If there was no crisis, that was all that he needed to explain it. It was a case of less in and more out. DCS was not the Department of choice.  It explained why staff were leaving but he wanted to go to the disciplinary table which showed a Department at war with itself. There were so many cases of misconduct but only 118 dismissals. What was happening in the Department? DCS could never get stability if the people who were supposed to look after inmates and the department, were involved in misconduct. It was problematic. The table showing utilisation of leave showed that top management used a lot of leave.

P83 and P62: Mr Dyantyi said two targets that DCS had missed because it had come so close to the targets should not be counted as missed targets.

Finances (AR
P135 Legal services: the costs seemed to be very high, considering that the fees went mostly for paying legal fees for actions against their own staff. He wanted a breakdown of legal fees paid showing what the fees were for, e.g. CCMA, court, etc.

P137 – social benefits: all of those issues from municipalities, households, etc showed a significant over-expenditure. 588% over-expenditure, etc. It went to thousands of percentages in some cases. Something had to be horribly wrong. What was happening? The CFO needed to explain that.

P173 – Mr Dyantyi referred to an explanation of variances of R15 billion that had been adjusted. Goods and services were at R6 billion. DCS’s explanation was that it was operating leases and accommodation charges. The interest on land from a zero budget to overspend by R2 million. That was bad planning. He required an explanation.

P 174Transfers and subsidies – post-retirement services: Mr Dyantyi stated that one knew exactly who would be retiring. A department could anticipate retirements. He knew when he would retire based on his age.

Post-retirement expenditure – at what point had the DCS realised that those people would retire. Those were flimsy explanations that were not helpful.

Ms J Mofokeng (ANC) stated that many of her questions had been covered but she was concerned about the criteria for getting into safe houses. Concerning performance agreements, why had five not been signed? She thanked the DCS for giving an education to the young people and ensuring the pass rate, etc. The opening of the school was commendable. She also commended the qualified audit status. She noted the problems of overcrowding but the Minister and the Deputy Minister had to look at that. However, she noted the problem with the Department of Public Works (DPW) which was a problem across departments and said that there had to be a joint meeting with DCS and DPW.

Ms Mofokeng noted that there was no comment on the juveniles. Were they at schools? That was very important. She asked about the challenges experienced in Administration where only 7 out of 11 targets had been achieved. The reasons for the resignation did not give information about what the Department had learned from the exit interviews and what plans it had for retaining staff. Regarding the SMS structure, she wanted to know why there were 73 women and 97 men. When was the Department going to reach the 50% target for women? What about the staff with a disability? No numbers were given for resignations. Had any of those people resigned and, if so, what had their challenges been? She commented on the eight foreigners as workers in DCS. Why employ them? Did they have rare skills? There were SAs who were not working.

Ms Mofokeng noted the number of people who participated in spiritual services. No wonder so many ex-convicts became pastors. Was the number given that of churches and spiritual organisations or was it the number of inmates? It was not clear. How far had the DCS gone in implementing the judgement regarding the transgender inmate? The parole boards at different prisons were in the media. Why did they not operate uniformly? When would DCS give them the information that it needed about the challenges experienced with the way that the parole boards were run? She noted that there had been many complaints that DCS never engaged in public participation and never educated the community on parole boards?

Noting the stakeholders that were working with DCS, she asked how the NGOs were appointed and how many had been appointed? She had received a letter the previous day and would share with the Deputy Minister. The letter indicated that 35 women from Mondeor in Johannesburg wanted to know why they were not considered for parole when wrong people were paroled. The Deputy Minister should address that but she would first share the letter with the Chairperson of the Correctional Services Sub-Committee.  There was legislation about parole but it appeared that some of the people working in parole boards, did not care about the victims. People were only given a short to prepare for parole. Some people knew all about parole and others did not. All SAs needed to know their rights regarding parole. She asked the Deputy Minister about the Bapoo judgement.

Ms Newhoudt-Druchen had remembered her last question. She noted that on slide 54 on vacancies, if she took the total divided by the vacancies, she came to 10.76 % but the average indicated on the slide was 5%. How was the average worked out?

The Acting Chairperson had a few questions and indicated that the answers could be supplied in writing. He asked for an update on the investigation by the SIU on the five proclamations. He also had a serious concern regarding compliance by DCS with competitive bidding processes in cases where contracts were beyond R500 000.  What was the situation there?

The Acting Chairperson thanked the Commission and the Deputy Minister and called for a brief break in proceedings.

Responses by DCS
The National Commissioner informed the Acting Chairperson that that his staff would respond to the questions. If there was anything not answered at the end, he would address those questions.

Incarceration
Ms Vuyi Mlomo-Ndlovu, Acting Chief Deputy Commissioner: Remand Operations Management, DCS, stated that there were three categories of mentally ill patients. Critically ill or mentally patients were sent to a psychiatrist as it was difficult to keep mentally ill patients without their having treatment. DCS had observation cases and in those cases it referred the inmate to the relevant hospitals but there was nothing DCS could do while that person was on a waiting list. State patients were the outcome of the observation cases. Timeframes were not always clear, although DCS should have such patients only for a short time. The law said that there should be 14 days from when the court referred the person to the Department of Health (DoH) and then there were 14 days which DoH should utilise to place the patient, but there was a shortage of state hospital beds so the DoH visited inmates while they were still in correctional services. The shortage was particularly bad in Eastern Cape where patients were being visited by psychiatrists while still in correctional service facilities. Severely mentally ill persons who were DCS inmates could be referred to the mental establishments but after stabilisation, they were sent back to DCS.

Ms Mlomo-Ndlovu explained that the pastoral care figures in the AR referred to the number of inmates who participated in individual care sessions offered by full-time care DCS staff and registered service providers from churches that were registered with DCS. The statistics were based on all services rendered.

She added that all AVR sites were all accredited.

Security
Mr Lucky Mthethwa, Chief Security Officer, DCS, responded to the question regarding the discrepancy between DCS and JICS statistics (58 versus 103) in respect of unnatural deaths. JICS reported on all reported deaths. DCS reported only on those confirmed by medical practitioners as unnatural. There would be no similarity in numbers. There were preventive measures to deal with the issue. The Assault Preventative Plan was being implemented in all facilities and where it was not implemented, there were consequence measures.

Mr Mthethwa stated that the target regarding escapes had been achieved. There had been 56 escapes and there had been a re-arrest of 44 of the escapees. It was an increase of six escapes from 2017/18 to 2018/19 because of the mass escape of the remandees in Johannesburg. The reasons for the escapes had been staff not complying and an element of corrupt activities. People had been arrested and consequence management had been implemented. DCS had a plan to enforce policies and procedures regarding security and encouraged surprise visits by management and the security committees established as required by legislation in all Department. DCS had diagnosed the problems and had come up with preventative measures and, in so doing, had achieved the target.

On drugs, he explained that one drug entering the facilities was one too many. It was not accepted. If it happened, it meant that the authority of the state was being diminished so DCS had a plan to keep up with the attempts to smuggle in drugs in line with the changing environment which was brought about by, among other things, the 4th Industrial Revolution. DCS had identified emergency security teams to assist in searches and actively participated with other government services involved in rooting out illegal substances. That had produced good results. He could not report on the details because the matter was sub judice and some DCS members were involved. A team was working with other institutions in trying to come up with a masterplan regarding contraband and security. One of the grey areas was the lack of security personnel and DCS was working on a new security model as it was one of the pillars of DCS. The Department was working closely with JCSP cluster to address security concerns and other organisations such as CSIR.

CDC Katenga responded to the calculation of the vacancy rate. It was based on the staff complement of 41 463. 38 344 posts were filled which equalled 92.5% of the establishment. Taking that figure from 100% gave one a 7.5% vacancy rate. He also responded to the question on therapeutic diets on page 83 where the planned target was 12% and the actual achievement was just over. DCS did not want to exceed 12%

Human Resources
Mr Moeketsi Mashibini, CDC for Human Resources, DCS, responded to the issue of foreign workers. They were usually spiritual workers employed on a month-to-month to render religious care. In respect of discipline, the AR shows 118 dismissals. Mr Dyantyi had commented that the Department was fighting with itself. On page 122 of the AR indicates the different types of misconduct. 34 officials were charged for using property of state without permission, e.g. officials who were renting out their houses and pocketing the money. That was serious. Assaulting offenders and colleagues and sleeping on duty were serious offences as they threatened the safety of their own colleagues in the operating environment. DCS had to take strict measures. Resolution 1 of 2002 for non-SMS members and the SMS conduct handbook regulated the statutory conditions. In both, serious versus non-serious conduct offences were identified. Non-serious offences could be addressed with written warnings, etc. but serious offences resulted in people being dismissed from the Service.

He explained the process of job evaluation which upgraded officials using the tool provided by the Public Service and Administration. It was important for the retention of members. Especially in SCM, people in those areas were employed at a higher level in other departments and so the people were moving to other departments because they were appointed at higher levels and paid more for the same work. Hence the upgrading of posts to levels comparable with other departments.

Mr Mashibini explained that the vacancy rate was an historical problem. When he had assumed the portfolio, he had seen how high the vacancy rate was and he had gone back through the ARs from 2013/14 and found that there had been a high vacancy rate each year.  DCS had needed to understand the problem before attempting to remedy the situation. One challenge that he had found in filling critical posts was that the appointment processes were centralised at head office because of section 96(3) of the Act which provided that all appointments above Director level had to take place in conjunction with the Minister and the Head of Department. That meant that no one from the regions could make appointments from the level of a Director and above. The DCS would be recommending the decentralisation of the appointment process. Currently, the selection panel had to include the Minister or Deputy Minister and high level appointments such as the Head of Department and Regional Heads and they were never available. The Division had decided to indicate in the appointment letter to the panel that the process had to be finalised by a particular date. In addition, shortlisted candidates often had excuses for not attending and so the panel had to be re-scheduled for one person to be interviewed and it was a struggle to get the panel back again. It was said to be a strategy of some candidates so that they could get questions from other candidates before they were interviewed. They were investigating the truth of that information but currently DCS was requiring a letter from the doctor for an absence from an interview.

He added that another problem was the disappearance of appointment submissions. When people were not happy with an appointment, the entire file with all the certificates and information disappeared. Now, the policy was that there had to be copies of submissions and certificates. He had investigated and had held officials accountable for that practice. Another challenge was that some senior managers participated in several interview processes. When that person did their job, he did not know, but such a person delayed other processes. One was now allowed to participate in no more than two interview panels at a time. DCS also had to rely on the assistance of experts for certain posts and so people from other departments were requested to assist on the panels. That also delayed interviews.

Mr Mashibini added that intermittent and unscheduled advertising of posts had not made the process any easier. DCS now had one recruitment drive in a year so that all candidates could move through the selection process at the same time. The CDC posts would be advertised this coming weekend. The posts had been kept together. Of the 31 posts advertised, 18 were for shortlisting and 10 candidates had been moved horizontally into the posts. DCS would fill 30 SMS posts by the end of December 2019.

In responding to questions on exit interview, he stated that the Department had learned about the reasons why people left. 425 had resigned. Mr Mashibini had called them and asked them to reconsider the position but the people were looking for better salaries. They just wanted to get more money because they were heavily indebted. Others wanted transfers to the departments that offered better conditions. He had tried but it was difficult to change someone’s mind.

Officials who did not signing the performance agreement were sent a non-performance letter. The Department made the person aware that he or she would not benefit from any pay progression or bonuses as a result of not signing the letter. To make sure everyone was aware of the issue, DCS would be conducting workshops where all senior members in the Department would be taken through the performance agreement so that employees could understand why they would not enjoy benefits. The Department was also considering consequence management.

He pointed out that it was not only senior managers who were frequently sick but it was also junior managers and members on the ground. Years ago, HR practitioners used to visit the person to see if he or she was in the bed. They also questioned the doctor. But that was now outside the ambit of the law and the employer could not ask why a person was booked off by a medical practitioner.

Mr Mashibini agreed that not much had been done about equity. However, the current process was intended to address that problem. Only under extreme circumstances, would DCS not reach the target. 0.7% of the employees were disabled but the DCS would engage relevant institutions to encourage physically disabled persons to apply for positions. He added that some facilities were not disability friendly.

IT Management
Nthabiseng Msupye stated that the service provider for the IIMS had been paid on deliverables and so had not been paid in full.

Court Judgement
Ms Mlomo-Ndlovu responded to the query about the Phaahla judgement which had given DCS 24 months to make changes in the Correctional Services Act but DCS had had to implement the judgement immediately. A circular had been sent out on 30 May 2019 explaining all the processes to identify all offenders who had to be reviewed to comply with the Phaahla judgement. 50 inmates had benefitted. The National Commissioner had decided to appoint a task team to manage the changes to the Act. The Bill process was very long but the official would make proposed amendments and send it through all the relevant structures to get the Bill to Parliament. A delay was caused by contemplation as to whether those changes should be included in the review that DCS was undertaking of the entire Act. However, as the timeframe was only 24 months, DCS had made the decision to amend the current Act in order to meet the deadline.

Adv Breytenbach asked if DCS would make it within the 24 months.

Facilities
Dr Botha responded to questions on bed spaces. The 12 bed spaces in C-Max project had been finalised in the previous year and DCS had received the occupancy certificate. In terms of bed spaces, DCS was challenged, which was why the task team had been appointed to look at bed spaces. The initial increase of 12 bed spaces, although the project had been to transform the facility from a prison to a correctional centre and bed spaces had been a spin-off. The project had been delayed but a great achievement was the fact that the facility was totally off the grid when it came to hot water, thanks to the solar system. The Department embraced technology and would use that as a model for other centres.

The Standerton facility had been delayed due to water shedding because of the drought and the municipality had cut off the water supply for construction work. However, the facility had been opened in May 2019. Glencoe was a refurbishment project as a result of which 660 bed spaces were regained at the end of June 2019. DCS had received the occupancy and construction certificates. The Parys site was handed over to the contractor in February 2019. It was one of the projects given to the Development Bank of Southern Africa (DBSA) because DPW was so slow. DCS did not want to sit around and then come to the Committee and complain about DPW as DCS was responsible for the facility. The contractor was making good progress. DCS had signed a Memorandum of Agreement with the DBSA for several projects because of challenges with DPW.

Responding to the question on the costs of the Tzaneen facility, Dr Botha reminded the Committee that the contractor had been liquidated but added that the majority of the costs of the new contractor would be paid from a suspension account into which funds for the penalty clauses had been paid. It had been a challenging site since the contractor had been liquidated. There had been theft of cables during the break from construction and the previous contractor had taken some shortcuts that had had to be addressed. Weekly project meetings were held on site. The envisaged hand-over date was the end of November 2019. As soon as a Department had an expansion of over 20% or R2 million on a construction project, it had to get a Variation Order from National Treasury as per the National Treasury Note. Waiting for National Treasury approval had caused further delays.

The Burgersdorp facility was a new centre in the Eastern Cape with 311 bed spaces. Plans had been finalised and the tender would go out for a contractor before the end of the year and the intention was to start on the first day of the 2020/21 financial year. With the Lichtenburg facility, the environmental assessment report was outstanding from the local municipality but DCS had recruited a professional team to work on the project and it was anticipated that the tender would go out before the end of December so that that the contractor could also start on the first day of the 2020/21 financial year.

Regarding the allegations of overcrowding in the Western Cape, Dr Botha explained that DCS was planning to renovate an old, decommissioned centre at Brandvlei which would give 690 bed spaces in an area where they were needed. Consultants were currently being appointed.

Finance
Mr Ligege, said that there were three cases of irregular or fruitless and wasteful expenditure which related to family members being involved. There had not been any investigations as there was not a dedicated investigating unit that dealt with irregular expenditure but the Department had resuscitated a Chief Directorate called Internal Control and Compliance. It was consolidated with the Chief Directorate for Risk Management, although those inspectors also had other work to do to do with service evaluation of management and regions.

He informed the Committee that the conflict of interest had come about when the AG ran the Computer-Assisted Audit Techniques (CATT) system in which the AG linked data across the organs of state and found 154 cases of possible conflict of interest. DCS did the investigations to find evidence of misconduct and had come up with 28 cases out of the 154 where it found officials of other departments were doing work with DCS. DCS could only access the employee records of government departments. Those cases were being referred to their employers. There had been 36 cases in which officials had resigned or were deceased and the cases had to be closed. There were 13 cases where officials were found not to be working for the Public Service. 49 cases found some conflict by officials of DCS and those had been to their area supervisors or directors who had to do consequence management by 30 October 2019. 38 cases were still being investigated. It was hoped that all cases would be closed by March 2020.

Mr Ligege explained that the irregular expenditure and fruitless and wasteful expenditure cases were being investigated but the DCS had been previously been unable to reconcile national and provincial records as it had not had a database. In the 2018/19 AR, DCS had explained that 80% of the irregularities could be attributed to three cases: Independent Development Trust (IDT) amounting to R1,816 million, the Nutrition contract at R707 million (since concluded), and one was a contract with the Department of Higher Education from 2014. The three cases could not be concluded until all investigations were complete. Together the amount was R2.7 billion. Other cases were being investigated. DCS had concluded 750 out 875 cases in respect of irregular expenditure, and 146 cases out of 249 cases of fruitless and wasteful expenditure.

The New Framework required all those cases be sent to the National Treasury Chief Procurement Office as National Treasury wanted to take away the responsibility from Accounting Officers. CDC Ligege added that in the Forum of CFOs, a concern had been raised that National Treasury might not have the capacity to manage all the cases that would come through.

Responding to Mr Dyantyi’s concerns about the strategic management only being done in the following year, Mr Ligege explained that the report was referring to the 2019/20 financial year and the Department would have the first round of contracts ready by the end of June 2020. The changes of the SCM prescripts had taught DCS that there had to be continuous training. For example, there were new procurement rules regarding designated groups and people had to be trained in the new rules. Bid reviews had been taking place since 2016 and irregular expenditure had been prevented but the tenders had been stopped and that meant that there were no contracts for food and hygiene so those items had been bought on quotation but, because a contract ought to have been in place, everything spent over the time without a contract had to be added up and then that had exceeded the relevant authority. Combatting one form of irregular expenditure had led to another. He would provide details regarding gifts in writing.

The legal case expenditure was mainly related to motions regarding parole. The post-retirement benefits related to medical aid payments to GEMS. Some retirees received 100% funding of their medical aid. Payment of such funds used to be under CoE budget but that expenditure was no longer under CoE but had to be placed under Household. When the budget had been appropriated by Parliament, the budget for those post-retirement benefits had been in the wrong place. CDC Ligege stated that DCS was waiting the approval of Parliament in order to align the expenditure.

Mr Ligege responded to Adv Breytenbach’s question about the write-offs of the Integrated Justice System (IJS). DCS participated in the Department of Justice IJS programme through its IIMS programme. The process of claiming funds meant one spent the funds, raised a debtor and invoiced the DoJ&CD. However, because IIMS had been found to be non-compliant as it was not procured through the State Information Technology Agency (SITA), DoJ&CD could not pay against those invoices until IIMS was cleared by SITA. The debt had been raised in 2015/16. The funding was impaired and therefore was written off.

He added that entertainment expenditure related to entertainment by the Ministry when it had engagements with stakeholders.

Conclusion
The Acting Chairperson asked for the remaining answers in writing as there was a House sitting that afternoon.

The National Commissioner agreed that he would respond in writing. He thanked the Acting Chairperson and the Committee for the frank engagement. He acknowledged Mr Dyantyi’s remarks and said that it was important for his staff that they heard that their work was appreciated because some of the people at the coal face had a thankless task. DCS was a huge institution and should not be underestimated. He took full responsibility but it was going to take time to get the DCS aligned to the service model and get greater alignment. The Department wanted assess the impact. They did not work in a vacuum as they were at the front end of the social cluster. He looked forward to further engagement.

The Deputy Minister commented on the question of JICS. The matter was dealt with by the National Commissioner and the Judge and the matter was taken to DPSA. The National Commissioner had to appoint officials but JICS had to be seen to be independent. Regarding assistance to offenders, one could only do so much: receive offenders, try to rehabilitate them and give them skills and then release them. Thereafter, it was the responsibility of the community and other departments to ensure that the skills were used. It was not illegal to employ a person with a criminal record but they had to declare what kind of life they had had. For example, when asked where they had obtained their qualifications, they would have to reveal that it was in correctional services. The Minister had instructed him to work very closely with the Department.

The Acting Chairperson asked if seven days would be sufficient for the responses from DCS.

The National Commissioner agreed to the deadline.

Mr Dyantyi asked the Chairperson to inform DCS about the Sub-Committee on Correctional Services.

The Acting Chairperson informed DCS that the Sub-Committee on Correctional Services would deal with many of the matters but something like an AR would not be delegated to the Sub-Committee.

The meeting was adjourned.

 

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