NYDA Board vacancies: scoring of candidates

Meeting report

Scoring of candidates interviewed for the NYDA Board

The Chairperson opened the meeting and apologised for the confusion caused earlier when the Committee could not meet for its morning session because of transport challenges for members.

She went on to outline the agenda for the day. The main task for the meeting was for members to pronounce on their scores for each of the candidates interviewed for the record. The Committee would then reconvene on a date that will be communicated in the near future, where, guided by the legal and research teams, scores will be collated and the top 10 candidates established. The Committee will then confirm the details regarding demographics (race, gender, persons with disabilities and geographical spread).

She thanked the members for the participation in the process. They all understood that the sole task of the Committee was and is to find the most patriotic, passionate, skilled and qualified young people to serve on the new NYDA Board. The Committee was privileged to have interacted with 19 young people from all over the country, with impressive skillsets including two doctoral degrees, entrepreneurs, youth development practitioners and a lawyer. She thanked the candidates for putting themselves up for this task. It was regrettable that social media posts had reposted interviews of some candidates who could not answer some questions. This was unfortunate and amounted to cyber-bullying. It goes against the spirit of what the Committee wanted to achieve, which is to give young people a hand up, and not discourage them.

She then invited the members to state their names and refer to each candidate by code (to protect candidates' information considering the Protection of Personal Information Act).

The members pronounced on their scores for each candidate (by allocated code) as advised by the Chairperson. The members submitted their scores in this order:

Ms E Spies (DA), Ms J Petersen (PA), Ms FL Shabangu (ANC), Ms M Pholwane (ANC), Mr T Tshotetsi (ANC), Ms A Khanyile (DA), Mr S Lonzi (EFF), Ms T Chauke-Adonis (ANC), Ms M Rweqana (MK), Ms L van der Merwe (IFP).

Mr S Lonzi (EFF) raised an issue that he said he had picked up while going through the NYDA Act, which related to the age limit of applicants (18-35 years of age). He noted that at least two candidates turned 35 between December last year and February 2025, which may have made them ineligible for an appointment. The Chairperson said the matter would be referred to the legal adviser for verification, as members seemed to have different understanding of the instructions of the Act in this regard.

Members were asked to hand in their scoring sheets to the support staff to collate scores.

The Chairperson said the next meeting would review the top 10 candidates, who will be presented in a report, confirm the age limit issue, and verify the demographic and geographical details of the chosen candidates.

The meeting was adjourned.