Government Printing Works & Independent Electoral Commission 2006/07 Strategic Plans & Budgets: presentations

Meeting report

HOME AFFAIRS PORTFOLIO COMMITTEE
17 May 2006
GOVERNMENT PRINTING WORKS AND INDEPENDENT ELECTORAL COMMISSION 2006/07 STRATEGIC PLANS AND BUDGETS: PRESENTATIONS

Chairperson: Mr H Chauke (ANC)

Documents handed out:
Strategic plan 2006/07 Government Printing Works
Government Printing Works Financials 2003-2006
The Electoral Commission of South Africa
Strategic Plan of the IEC 2006/07

SUMMARY
The Government Printing Works and the Independent Electoral Commission briefed the Committee on their strategic plans and budgets for 2006/07. Members raised concerns, which were later addressed by the two organisations. For both presentations, the Committee expressed its concern about the manner in which documentation was forwarded. Members complained that they were unable to raise relevant questions because they only got the presentation at the meeting. Government Printing Works and Independent Electoral Commission officials accepted criticism and assured the Committee that in future, they would avail information well in advance to avoid any inconvenience.

MINUTES
Briefing by the Government Printing Works (GPW)
The Chief Executive Officer of GPW, Mr Tom Moyane presented the strategic plan for 2006/2007. He indicated that GPW envisaged being the first choice printer in Africa. The GPW had a mandate to supply the state with secure printing of passports, identification documents, visa labels and other face value documents printed in a secure environment. The presentation covered the staff complement, which indicated 630 employees represented in five provinces of the country. The staff was responsible for producing security printing and related services, dissemination of government information and producing stationary services.

The GPWs’ SWOT analysis indicated that Government remained a secure client, while the challenge was the lack of strategic direction and unsustainable core ideology. Opportunities included the people-capability and capacity building within the organisation, while there were threats indicating that Government clientele were no longer secured and the culture of non-payment by customers.

The GPWs’ market development was to develop a creative and aggressive marketing strategy and plan through a quantitative market survey and analysis. The organisation also prioritised developing stakeholder relations by introducing a call centre. The organisation also hoped to strengthen its people balance sheet, improve leadership development and introduce staff development programmes. The GPW noted improvements in finance, highlighting that a finance system was assessed, while inventory of assets was established. Moreover the organisation engaged in a process of restructuring the GPW into a flatter structure, while it developed a health and safety strategy for staff. The GPW envisaged developing and implementing an internal audit coverage plan.

Discussion
Mr M Swart (ANC) commented that in future, the GPW should forward their presentation well in advance to allow Members enough time to understand and ask relevant questions. He added that the presentation did not outline time frames indicating when and how they would implement action plans.

Mr Moyane assured the Committee that by next week, a detailed document would be sent indicating timeframes and cost implications.

Mr K Morwamoche (ANC) wanted to know what position GPW held regarding the disclaimer released by the Auditor General. He further asked why the material used to produce passports still had the old logo and was in an unconstitutional language.

Mr Moyane answered that there were challenges in as far as the disclaimer made by the Auditor General was concerned. He said that part of the challenge was that the GPW did not possess enough skilled personnel. It was unfortunate that he could not respond to the passport material as the GPWs’ role was to print what the Department of Home Affairs had designed already The Department of Home Affairs would be in a better position to explain the language used in the South African passports as that was a policy issue in which the GPW did not play a role.

Mr M Sibande (ANC) asked what security measures were put in place to ensure that syndicates could not produce similar documents as it was alleged in the media in the past weeks. Mr Sibande was also concerned that there were government departments that had lost confidence in the GPW and were in consultation with other printing companies. What were the reasons for that?

Mr Moyane explained that in relation to the allegations in media reports, syndicates had stolen copies of identity documents and passports and were using them to make illegal birth certificates. Security features on those documents could not allow them to print new fraudulent documents. He further indicated that currently most legal documents did not have security features and there was no legislation to regulate the use thereof which made things a bit difficult for GPW as well as other institutions involved in producing legal documents. It was critical that immigration officials became more careful and well trained when executing their duties which would ensure that enough security measures were put in place as was the case in other countries outside South Africa.

The Chairperson asked if it would be proper to recommend that the Department of Home Affairs be suspended from issuing identity documents together with other legal documents until there were proper security measures put in place. He felt that this would reduce the cases of corruption in South Africa using identity documents.

The Committee felt that it would be difficult to monitor that, as there were people who legitimately required documents for a wide variety of services such as grants. However the Committee agreed with the Chairperson that serious measures needed to be sought to prevent the loss and corruption the country faced.

Mr Sibande raised his concern that the GPW was considering relocation at a critical time when the 2010 World Cup would be held in South Africa. Were there any plans to ensure that there was no interference in as far as entry into South Africa was concerned?

Mr Moyane responded that there would not be any implications for the preparations on the World Cup as a result of the relocation. He indicated tickets would be printed in time and all other measures would be implemented to ensure that by the time the company had relocated, all the equipment would be in good condition in the new offices.

Ms S Kalyan (DA) asked Mr Moyane to clarify what was happening with regards to the shortage of printing paper. She asked what the current staff complement was, were there any shortages of staff and if so, what had GPW done to correct the situation?

Mr Moyane answered that they were hoping to get printing paper from Del Aru [?????]. He added that GPW on its own never ran out of paper. He indicated that GPW had 630 staff members and that was an ideal number because of the work that was done manually. Currently there were no staff shortages other than at management and professional level where there were not enough trained electrical engineers for the maintenance of machinery and other requirements.

Dr S Huang (ANC) asked what the status of the machinery was currently and what implications the relocation would have on the purchase of new equipment. He also asked if there was a cost accountant to look into costing issues.

Mr Moyane responded that old equipment would be kept and be used during the relocation period while the new equipment would be monitored to ensure that there were no interruptions. He indicated that GPW had not had a cost accountant for a long period of time.

Mr W Skhosana (ANC) asked what relationship existed between the GPW and other Government departments. Were there international countries that still owed GWP, as was the case previously? Mr Skhosana requested the CEO to update the Committee on the provincial offices and what kinds of problems were experienced at that level.

Mr Moyane indicated that there were no relationships with the government departments and that was something that they were hoping to establish in future. He answered that there were countries that owed them money and there were problems in recovering the money because most transactions dated back a long way and was difficult to track. He indicated that the most serious problems were found in the Bisho office in the Eastern Cape. He highlighted that there were problems around leadership as capacity was not enough. It was also a concern that there were only four offices yet there were nine provinces in the country. These were problems that required a lot of attention.

Mr Morwamoche asked what had happened to the previous CEO. Was he arrested or not?

Mr Moyane said that his predecessor had not been arrested.

The Chairperson thanked the delegation for an informative presentation. He said that the Committee had confidence in the new leadership, as it was clear that there was a move in the right direction.

Briefing by the Independent Electoral Commission (IEC)
The Chairperson of the IEC, Ms B Bam presented the aims and strategic objectives of the IEC, indicating that the IEC derived its mandate from Section 190 of the Constitution of the Republic of South Africa to manage elections of national, provincial and municipal legislative bodies in accordance with national legislation. Furthermore, the IEC had a duty to promote voter education, while it reviewed electoral legislation and proposed electoral election, and to make recommendations in connection therewith.

The strategic objectives of the IEC included entrenching the Commission as a focal point for the delivery of free and fair elections in the most efficient and cost effective manner. It had a responsibility to inform voters on electoral processes with a view of ensuring maximum participation and the least possible number of spoilt ballot papers. It had to ensure that necessary resources such as financial, human resources, information technology, corporate services, legal support, security as well as internal and external communications are maintained in order to ensure the effective functioning of the Commission. (Please see presentation for specific strategic objectives).

Discussion

Mr Swart again requested the delegation to avail the documentation in advance to give the Committee enough time to peruse documents in order to ask relevant questions. He said that there were no clear time frames indicating when actions would be executed. He said that the absence of time frames would not enable the Committee to monitor the successes and failures of the Commission.

Ms Bam answered that such information would be forwarded to the Committee.

Mr Sibande commended the IEC for the "wonderful" presentation. He then asked how the IEC hoped to reach residents in rural areas in providing input into the development of address allocation to all residents. He further asked what was the relationship between the Commission and traditional leaders.

Ms Bam indicated that the current system did not work according to individual addresses. The Commission was working closely with the Post Office to allocate voters addresses.

Mr Sibande asked how the Commission hoped to ensure that there was continuity in as far as voter training and education was concerned. He was concerned that the Commission did not fully utilise the services of the media especially by means of radio to educate voters on the importance of voting. He felt that such medium was only utilised before elections.

Ms Bam responded that the Commission was planning an agreement with radio stations to allow for continuous education. She indicated that the Commission envisaged possessing its own radio station.

Mr Skhosana asked how far the Commission hoped to go with providing voter education in an African context and what were the cost implications for such an undertaking. He also asked who was responsible for costs incurred in instances where some political parties took the IEC to court.

Ms Bam indicated that when the Commission offered assistance internationally, there were no contacts entered into to avoid complicated ties. She added that the Commission tried not to conduct voter education abroad but was always keen to share training material. Language became a key challenge in conducting voter education in international countries.

Mr Morwamoche expressed his concern about voting officials especially in rural areas. He said that it was imperative that they were given proper training as it became evident that in some instances they were not competent enough to understand their role in the voting process.

Ms Bam concurred that training of officials was not always perfect due to varying reasons. Attendance at training had often become a critical challenge because most of the voting officials would not be able to attend training sessions. The Commission had explored the possibility of extending training sessions into two days to accommodate people who missed the initial training sessions. Moreover it was the Commission’s intention to provide ongoing training to all possible voters and voting officials.

Mr Morwamoche asked whether or not the Commission utilised the services of the South African Government Printing Works.

Mr Muller stated that the Commission did on a regular basis use the GPW services, but like any other government company, they were more expensive and as such the Commission required services from private companies. However there were instances where the Commission was one of GPWs’ major clients.

The meeting was adjourned.