Question NW621 to the Minister of Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs
26 March 2021 - NW621
Komane, Ms RN to ask the Minister of Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs
Given that the 2020-21 financial year is the final year of the contracts of implementing agents at the Community Work Programme (CWP), what (a) measures have been put in place by her department to ensure that the noncompliance by many implementing agents have been addressed and (b) will happen to implementing agents at the CPW at the beginning of the 2021-22 financial year, especially those that have been seen not to comply with their service level agreements?
Reply:
a) What measures have been put in place by her department to ensure that the non-compliance by many implementing agents have been addressed:
There were two main areas of non-compliance by the implementing agents. The first one had to do with providing supporting documents and invoices for money allocated to them for project implementation. The second one, also related to the first, had to do with reporting on their activities in relation to their Service Level Agreement.
In addressing the first non-compliance, the department implemented a process wherein the payments to NPOs fully accounted for any advances paid to them before further disbursements were made. The net effect was that for the year 2021, there was full compliance on all matter related to outstanding invoices. As a result of this practice, compliance related to invoices as measured by the suspense account is at 95%, with the balance being amounts disbursed later related to special projects.
In terms of previous year non-compliance, a special team comprised of NPOs and CWP staff was constituted to re-look and journalise the invoices related to financial years 2018/19 and 2019/20. This process yielded results that led to full accountability for these years. The Project is 90% complete, and what is left is eliminating any possible duplicate invoices and balancing to the financial system.
Regarding the non-compliance to the Service Level Agreement (SLA), various workshops were held with all the NPOs with the purpose of unpacking the SLAs and their responsibilities to that effect. All the reporting requirements were explained and the NPOs were assisted with the reporting templates. Currently there are no NPOs who are non-compliant as compliance to the SLA is linked to the financial accountability.
b) What will happen to the implementing agents at the CPW at the beginning of the 2021-22 financial year, especially those that have been seen not to comply with their service level agreements?
All the NPOs are compliant as stated above. Compliance with the SLA is linked to the NPOs’ eligibility to receive any funding from the department.
The contracts of all CWP Implementing Agents have been extended by six months starting from 01 April 2021.