IEC & GPW 2022/23 Annual Performance Plans; with Ministry

Meeting report

The Committee was briefed by the Independent Electoral Commission (IEC) and the Government Printing Works (GPW) on their annual performance plans (APPs) and budgets for the 2022/23   financial year. The Minister of Home Affairs, Dr Aaron Motsoaledi, and the Deputy Minister, Mr Njabulo Nzuza, were present.   

Opening remarks

The Chairperson expressed the Committee’s appreciation of the work done by the previous chairperson of the IEC, Mr Glen Mashinini. He noted that his term of office had now ended and wished him well in his future endeavours. He said the Committee had noted that the IEC had recently tabled its report on the 2021 local government elections. The Committee would schedule a meeting to consider that report. He said the Committee had been interacting with the GPW on various issues in conducting oversight over it.

Ms Janet Love, Vice-Chairperson of the IEC, said she appreciated the work done by the Committee in dealing with IEC issues, especially as they pertained to changes to the electoral system. The IEC’s APP and budget would provide details on developments in the decade ahead.  The IEC, as well as the Committee and other government entities, was working in a period of great uncertainty with wars, pandemics and other disasters raging on. There had also been a number of changes in the area of elections and South Africa’s electoral law. There had also been changes in the area of political party funding. Electoral law reform would require technological changes. The IEC had considered all of these issues when finalising its APP and budget. She appreciated the clean audit outcome that the IEC had received from the Auditor-General of South Africa (AGSA) and the consistent work that had been done by the delegation from the IEC.  She thanked the Chairperson and the Committee for the acknowledgement of the work done by Mr Mashinini.

IEC Annual Performance Plan 2022/23

Mr Sy Mamabolo, Chief Electoral Officer, and Ms Andile Mbatha, Chief Financial Officer, presented the APP to the Committee.

The Committee heard that for the 2022/23 financial year, the IEC had 14 performance targets across four programmes with a budget of R2.24 billion. The IEC budget had been cut by R278.5 million for the 2022/23 financial year, R240.24 million for the 2023/24 financial year, and R251 million for the 2024/25 financial year, amounting to budget cuts of R769.75 million over the three years. The implications of these budget cuts for the 2023/24 financial year were that a second registration weekend was not funded, the Democracy Education Fieldworkers (DEFs) were not funded, and the expansion staff appointment periods had been reduced.

Further budget cuts would be almost impossible to absorb in a registration year. The 2024 elections would be “uncharted territory.” The operational and financial impacts of the legislative changes were not yet known, but might be significant. There were no previous baselines that could be used as a comparative figure. In addition, the judgment by the Constitutional Court requiring electoral law reform placed pressure on the funding of the IEC. It was likely to have a significant impact on the rewriting of ICT business applications, the retraining of staff, the possible re-delimitation of voting districts, and the possible reconfiguration of the IEC’s local offices. The IEC provided the Committee with a detailed outline on how the budget cuts would affect its projects and programmes.

See presentation for further detail

Discussion

Ms L van der Merwe (IFP) stated that the issue of the recent elections having a low voter turnout must be addressed by the IEC and by political parties, as there seemed to have been a trust deficit between political parties and the general public. She referred to the IEC’s targets relating to the registration of voters and asked for clarity on why the target remained stagnant for the next three years at around 26 million voters, especially given that South Africa had around 40 million eligible voters. Why was the target reduced in the upcoming years?

Regarding the civic education programmes, she stated that the IEC would be rolling out the programmes to the University of the Witwatersrand and would make them part of the school curriculum. She asked whether voter education would be taught only in 2022 or whether it would become a permanent feature of the school curriculum. She stated that it would be quite useful in addressing the issues around low voter turnout, the registration of voters, and ensuring that citizens were actively part of elections. It would also help to mitigate some of the issues found in the last elections. The IEC was doing well in terms of its social media campaigns, but she noted that, in the last election, one specific social media post caused quite a lot of negative media attention and the public was generally unhappy with that post. She asked for more details on the lessons learned and whether there would be better checks and balances going forward regarding the content of the IEC’s social media posts.

Ms M Molekwa (ANC) applauded the achievement of a clean audit opinion from the AGSA and expressed hope that the IEC would maintain this. She stated that while the Committee understood that there were challenges experienced by the IEC during the 2021 local government elections, there was a need for clarity about whether the IEC had a plan to ensure that these issues were not repeated, especially regarding the challenges and uncertainties as to whether the elections would continue. Was the IEC ready to ensure that more resources were directed to voter registration and campaigns to ensure that the issue of the low voter turnout was addressed?

Ms L Tito (EFF) noted that Mr Mamabolo had stated that there was a decline in political parties’ mobilising and campaigning. She asked for details on the IEC’s plans to address the issue of people who sought to be registered during the registration weekend only to find out during the elections that they did not appear on the voters’ roll. How would the IEC ensure that this issue was resolved?

Mr A Roos (DA) said that the IEC’s clean audit outcome was an achievement that could not be underestimated. He agreed with Ms van der Merwe’s contributions to the civic education programmes and social media campaigns. He referred to the mobile units of the Department of Home Affairs (DHA) that provided services and identity documents to school learners and asked whether representatives from the IEC’s local offices went with them to ensure that those learners registered. Regarding the implications of the IEC’s budget cuts, he asked for more clarity on the possibility of synchronised elections as mentioned in the briefing. He noted that the Committee had previously discussed the need for the IEC to move away from leasing buildings to owning them. He asked for an update on the IEC having its own head office and for clarity on the timeframes in this regard.

Mr K Pillay (ANC) stated that the 2021 Local Government Elections had seen a low voter turnout with many other challenges coupled with that, including limited voter education. What were the plans of the IEC to improve voter education? It was concerning that the targets in this regard had been reduced for the upcoming financial years. There was a need for the IEC to ensure that elections were not run in such a short space of time again. A firm timeline of events and processes was required to avoid any delays. The IEC should be prepared at all times. He asked for an update on how the IEC was adapting to new technologies and changes, and seeking alternatives to address the challenges experienced.

Responses

Mr Mamabolo, Chief Electoral Officer, referred to the unsuccessful application made to the Constitutional Court to defer the election. The denial of the request had created an electoral jurisprudence that the IEC now needed to follow. A precedent had been set for the IEC and for all electoral role-players that should be followed in the future. This meant that, despite any difficult circumstances, the elections must be run in the constitutionally-prescribed timeframes, and the elections must remain free and fair. However, in assessing the freeness and fairness of the election, there was a need to be mindful of the limitations imposed by the prevailing circumstances. With this understanding of the judgment of the Constitutional Court, the IEC had already commenced with the preparations for the 2024 elections. He stated that the Committee was correct in saying that there could not be another situation where there was doubt as to whether an election would happen, and this was mitigated by the electoral jurisprudence set by the Constitutional Court.

The IEC had recently conducted a review with the National Party Liaison Committee (NPLC) and areas for improvement had been noted. The IEC would engage with the NPLC on the progress made in those areas. Referring to the animosity that arose around the question of whether or not the elections would proceed, he stated that unfortunate remarks were made about the credibility of the IEC, in most instances without any supporting facts. This had a damaging effect on the political component of the electoral system, especially when made on social media by leaders of political parties. When anyone was convinced that the IEC was acting outside the standards imposed by the Constitution and the relevant laws, the proper procedures must be followed to investigate and determine whether the allegations were justified. When allegations were made which were not followed up and not supported by facts, it created a situation where members of the public began to have doubts about the credibility of the process even before the elections were held.

Mr Mamabalo said the IEC was preparing to engage with the Office of the Chief Procurement Officer about the issue of moving to its own head office. Regarding the possibility of a synchronised election, he stated that this was an issue of national policy and a discussion that the country must have. However, the idea had been on the table for a while. The IEC was monitoring the matter and would engage with the debate if it found traction.

The IEC needed to tie down the operational component of synchronising the delivery of smart IDs with its registration efforts. The IEC would work with the DHA to determine what could be done to create seamless and integrated operations regarding enlistment on the National Population Register, but this project was still in its formative stages.

Mr Masego Sheburi, Deputy CEO, Electoral Operations, dealt with questions about the voters’ roll. For the 2021 local government elections, general voter registration days were held on 18 and 19 September 2021, and 20 September was the date on which the elections were to be proclaimed. This meant that the IEC had just a matter of hours to convert the registrations that were recorded on 18 and 19 September 2021 onto the voters’ roll. Before 2021, the IEC usually had at least a month or two to do this same process. This haste resulted in the IEC encountering some challenges regarding the correctness or otherwise of some of those registrations. However, the IEC was able to recover the information on voting day and it was able to help all those voters whose details were incorrectly recorded in segments not related to the places of ordinary residence. When those people presented themselves at the base voting station, meaning the voting station at which they applied for registration, their details would be on the VMTs. With the VMTs, the IEC now had the intelligence to facilitate the registration of a voter anywhere in the country. It should be remembered that the VMTs were address-driven. The address provided determined the voting district and the segment of the voters’ roll in which a person was placed.

The IEC thus needed more nuanced communication so that people were aware that while they could present themselves anywhere, their actual registration would be driven by the address that they provided when they applied for registration. The IEC was now engaged in more meaningful work on maintaining segments of the voters’ roll to ensure that there was a relationship between the places of ordinary residence and the segments. Additionally, the Chief Electoral Officer was under an obligation to ensure that, when he became aware that a person’s registration status had changed, the registration details of the voter were updated. Regarding the rate at which people were registered, the mortality rate and the COVID-19 pandemic must be factored in. For the 2024 elections, the IEC would work to ensure that the targets were revised upwards and that it would have the resources for targeted and meaningful engagement with voters.

Mr Mawethu Mosery, Electoral Manager, responded to the questions about social media. He said the IEC had learnt lessons from the recent 2021 local government elections. It was working to form relationships with the social media platforms to look at their governance policies and management of information. The IEC would also focus on educating those who used these platforms. The IEC had embraced the existence of social media. It was now engaged in creating the necessary capacity to efficiently manage it so that the IEC could remain topical on these platforms. It was capacitating its resources and its own internal framework for posting content on social media. The IEC was concerned about the amount of misinformation and disinformation on these platforms and was working on a framework for engagement on social media by electoral management bodies.

However, the IEC’s use of social media did not negate its use of traditional media. It continued to engage with print, online and digital publications and radio as major communication platforms to reach almost every corner of the country. He expressed concern that most of the negative attention on social media posts was encouraged or supported by political parties and political leaders. The IEC had already started training workshops on the best utilisation of these platforms. Regarding civic education, he stated that the IEC would be able to reach all 4 000 wards through its activities to reach pre-COVID-19 levels.

Ms Love stated that the rollout to the universities would also focus on technical and tertiary institutions. The IEC would provide the Committee with more information on that at a later stage. On the issues of registration and low voter turnout, she stated that this was linked to the broader issues of democracy, education, and the ability of the IEC to engage for a protracted period and use additional staff in preparation for an election. However, as mentioned by the Chief Financial Officer, the IEC’s resources had been reduced. It meant that the extent to which the IEC was able to bring people into the fold of its electoral operations had been reduced. The training periods had also been reduced, and this factored into the challenges experienced.

Mr Mosotho Moepya, IEC Commissioner, stated that with the introduction of the VMTs, a concern was raised that voters would discover on voting day that their voter registration details had changed. This was something that the IEC had attended to in the by-elections that were held after the local government elections. Members would recall that part of the legislative amendments related to ensuring that when the IEC registered voters, their details would be communicated to them as soon as possible. Voters would then be able to compare this to what was recorded on the voters’ roll. The IEC had seen a number of voters whose details had been changed in that manner using the timeframe that Parliament had approved for voters to inspect the voters’ roll. There was a strong correlation between voter registration and the persons registered on the voters’ roll, especially in the period between elections. The relationship between voter registration and the general election was significant. Given that the correlation was high, the IEC had found that objections, additions, and corrections to the voters’ roll increased significantly in the period leading to an election.

Ms Love added that the IEC continuously encouraged people to check and confirm their details even if there was no election.

Dr Nomsa Masuku, IEC Commissioner, said South Africa had a large youth population. Fewer resources meant that the IEC struggled to reach youth outside the secondary or tertiary educational institutions. There was a dire need for more resources to enable the IEC to network more effectively and reach people outside the captive audiences.

The Minister, Dr Motsoaledi, stated that the reason for the political party funding was to make political parties self-sufficient so that they were not influenced by donors. There was a need to lobby for an increase in political party funding so that political parties themselves had the capacity to mobilise young people and voters to get them interested in politics and participate in the country’s democracy.

Government Printing Works (GPW) Annual Performance Plan 2022/23

Minister’s remarks

Minister Motsoaledi referred to an investigation into maladministration at the GPW that was chaired by a former advisor to former President Thabo Mbeki, Adv Mojankunyane Gumbi. The Committee would in due course receive a report about how the system at the GPW collapsed to such a degree that not even financial records could be salvaged for the AGSA.

Regarding the GPW’s foray into SADC countries, he stated that the goal was for the GPW to be the only facility of its kind on the whole of the continent so that African countries did not have to rely on their former colonial masters to print their identification documents. Extensive progress had been made in this regard. 

The Minister said that GPW’s organisational structure had been a problem for quite a long time, with many vacancies. Tremendous progress had been made. A new organisational structure had been approved, and work was being done to populate the organisational structure. The issue of the Master Plan Project had become even more important given the foray into the SADC region. This required good infrastructure and a properly capacitated staff.

However, the issue of the Master Plan Project was still a sore point. The National Treasury had given the GPW a three-year deviation not to use the Department of Public Works and Infrastructure, but to use the Development Bank of South Africa to deliver the project. However, there were still a lot of technical glitches to be sorted out. This project should move fast within the next three years to deliver a state-of-the-art building which befitted the work of the GPW.

Briefing by the GPW

Ms Alinah Fosi, Chief Executive Officer, and Mr Ian van der Merwe, Chief Financial Officer, presented the briefing.

The Committee was told that the focus for the upcoming financial year was to reposition the GPW’s business process in order to: ensure stability, sustainability and viability of the organisation as a critical national security facility; improve customer experience through timeous quality and quantity management; ensure a return on investment and sound financial management and sustainability; implement its long-term vision of being the state security printer of choice in the SADC region; recruit and develop the GPW’s workforce; and upgrade the facilities to ensure effective management of all operations.

For the 2022/23 financial year, the GPW had 18 performance targets aligned to its strategic plan. It was reviewing its organisational structure, which had been approved by the Minister of Home Affairs and the Minister of Public Service and Administration. The new structure would bolster the GPW’s capacity in all areas, particularly the core services of ICT and Finance. It would enable the GPW to be on par with new trends in the printing industry and invest in research and development. In addition, there had been a drive to fill the GPW’s critical vacant posts.

The GPW reported that it had continuously made an effort to address weaknesses within the internal control environment. This had been done through the establishment of oversight structures to provide a system of combined assurance. The Executive Committee had prioritised the implementation of a post-audit matrix to ensure that findings were addressed while simultaneously improving the control environment. To date, a total of 80 percent of the audit findings raised by both the AGSA and the GPW’s Internal Audit unit had been resolved by management. The remaining 20 percent were being addressed.

See presentation for further detail

Discussion

Ms van der Merwe emphasised that there was a need for a stable, healthy environment at the GPW. Had stability returned to the organisation and had the previous issues that were raised been addressed? She asked whether the animosity between leadership and staff at the organisation had been addressed, since there was a need for the GPW to have happy and productive staff. It was important that the Committee receive a full list of the current vacancies and the timeframes to fill those vacancies. She stated that the lack of information and a full breakdown of the GPW’s budget per programme had the effect of making the Committee’s oversight role impossible. She asked for the reasons why this budget breakdown was not given to the Committee. She noted that there had been a change in wording of a GPW target that made it unclear how the internal audit processes were related to the consulting services provided, and she asked for clarity,

She noted that the GPW’s security model was due to be implemented in the 2021/22 financial year. Why was a crash of the IT system and backup systems not picked up? She asked for more clarity on the GPW’s aim to train 60 percent of its total workforce and asked the delegation to elaborate on the Workplace Skills Planning (WSP) priorities outlined in the briefing.

Ms Molekwa welcomed the progress that had been made. Regarding the SADC development project, she expressed hope that all the countries would do business with the GPW. She appreciated the entity’s efforts in engaging those other countries that had already signed the MOUs. She also appreciated the progress made in the GPW’s audit outcome and hoped that it would be further improved. She appreciated that the GPW was actively addressing the issues raised by the AGSA.

Ms Tito said she appreciated that the GPW was leaving its footprints in the SADC region and all over Africa. She asked for a more concrete update on progress with this and whether the continent’s response had been positive or negative. She asked whether the GPW was putting pressure on the Department of Public Works and Infrastructure to get the Master Plan Project to move more quickly.

Mr Roos noted that the GPW had a server uptime of 95.5 percent, which translated to about three weeks of downtime. What systems were affected by this downtime? He noted that the GPW had changed the target of the audit plan from 100 percent to 90 percent because it believed that the target of 100 percent was unrealistic, yet the entity achieved the 100 percent target in the 2019/20 financial year.

In terms of key risks, he noted the failure to secure paper for the production of securely printed material and asked for more clarity because in the previous year’s APP, the GPW had mentioned that it would conduct research into acquiring its own paper mill and vertically integrating this process. What had happened to that investigation? He stated that there had been recent arrests in cases where syndicates were able to produce secure documents on security paper that could only be procured by a security printer. Did the GPW see this as a risk and was it investigating this matter as a key risk to the integrity of the documents that they produced? He agreed with Ms van der Merwe that the lack of information and full breakdown of the budgets per programme was concerning. He asked for clarity on the credit losses that the GPW was expecting, as well as details about its deferred income.

The Chairperson stated that there were a few issues that needed to be followed up on, and the Committee would need to engage with the GPW and the AGSA on another occasion. He welcomed the GPW’s progress in addressing 80 percent of the AGSA’s findings. There was a need to invite the GPW to appear before the Committee to deal specifically with the AGSA’s findings. He stated that the issue of the GPW’s Master Plan Project was quite important, and that the Committee had been dealing with the matter for a while. It had now reached a stage where there was a need to interact with the Portfolio Committee on Public Works.

The Committee appreciated the GPW’s footprint in the SADC region, but there was a need to improve the GPW’s capacity to ensure that its Master Plan Project was implemented. The Committee would engage with the Department of Public Works and Infrastructure to determine the difficulties relating to this matter so that it could be put to rest. He appreciated the confirmation from the Minister that the Committee would receive a report on the investigation into maladministration at the GPW. The Committee would ensure that the report’s recommendations were implemented because it was focused on cleaning out the corruption in the DHA. He asked the GPW to expand more on the newly approved organogram.

Mr Pillay proposed that the Committee convene a meeting with the Portfolio Committee on Public Works regarding the GPW’s Master Plan Project to ensure that the matter was fast-tracked. He applauded the progress that had been made in the GPW and stated that things would improve even more once it had created stability in its organisational structure. It was important to note that there had been significant progress on the side of the GPW.

Responses
Ms Fosi thanked the Committee for the inputs and questions and said they would help to shape the GPW going forward. It was important to note that the entity’s overall internal audit should remain independent so that it could not be captured by management.

The security model did not necessarily focus on systemic matters, as there was a separation between physical security and information security. The security model focused more on the physical security systems and was rooted in the ICT environment to monitor hardware and software issues. The security model would not have been in a position to detect the collapses.

The GPW had approached all 16 countries in the SADC region to present the products and services that the GPW offered. There had been no adverse responses, but there were internal processes, such as changes of political leadership and budgetary considerations, that could cause delays in the finalisation of the contracts. The finalisation of the Master Plan Project was critical in this regard.  There was appreciation for the idea of an African solution to the need for printing security documents. The GPW would continue to work on resolving the issues raised by the AGSA.

Ms Michelle Modise, General Manager: Human Resources, responded to the concerns about animosity between management and employees. She said a lot of progress had been made. Management had also made efforts to ensure that they took a stand against ill-disciplined conduct by not ignoring what could have triggered it or what the cost could have been. It was for this reason that the GPW started doing a culture audit. It had appointed, through its supply chain management, a service provider to do the audit so that the GPW could understand the issues that were troubling the employees and that led to such animosity. This included investigating what interventions should be done to transform the GPW’s organisational culture. One of the core issues involved the Benchmark project. Organised labour launched a dispute and ultimately embarked on a formal process to go on strike. The GPW had to go to court and the strike was ruled illegal.

Regarding the vacancies, she stated that the GPW’s new structure had recently been approved. The GPW would share with the Committee its three-year plan for phasing in the new structure, including the current vacancies and how it planned to fill those positions. The organisational structure had been reviewed to better respond to the GPW’s current needs and future plans for expanding its services to the SADC region. The Workplace Skills Plan highlighted critical training in technical and soft skills.

Mr van der Merwe stated that the GPW could make its budget breakdowns per programme available to the Committee. The GPW was rebuilding its digital information, but there was still a significant risk regarding the completeness and accuracy of the information for the 2021/22 financial year. The target for submission was 31 May 2022. The GPW had a good working relationship with the AGSA in terms of responding to their requests for information, and that relationship would be carried forward. The projected and deferred income at the end of the 2022/23 financial year was R277 million.

Mr Kuben Moodley, Chief Director: Operations and Production, responded to the questions on systems downtime. The GPW approached this issue holistically by looking at service hours and subtracting the downtime. Over a financial year, the GPW ran planned downtime for maintenance.  It was not possible to have 100 percent uptime. The GPW was working to establish itself as a global security printer with a good reputation that could be relied on. It was establishing a global presence in as many bodies and associations as possible and was working on projects with neighbours in the SADC region. The GPW did not want to expand and then not be able to deliver on its mandate. The next phase would involve capacitating itself with the necessary skills and equipment. The GPW had opted for a secure supply of paper apart from the research into producing it itself.  The procurement activities had started and the GPW had no concerns about running out of security paper. Regarding the arrests of syndicates, he stated that the biggest problem globally was not only the use of paper sourced by security printers but close enough replication of the paper for most of the public to be fooled.

Deputy Minister Njabulo said engagement at the level of the Portfolio Committees would be useful in solving the issues of the GPW.

The Minister referred to the issue of counterfeiting. He stated that the arrests of syndicates did not involve security paper used by the GPW. It was the DHA that had been defrauded. There would be more arrests in the next few weeks.

The meeting was adjourned.