SIU head says the manner in which outcomes of disciplinary proceedings arising from recommendations of their investigations do not demonstrate the effectiveness of consequence management.
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The Special Investigating Unit (SIU) head Andy Mothibi has flagged serious deficiencies in the implementation of consequence management following investigations into misconduct linked to the Unemployment Insurance Fund (UIF).
Mothibi said they found that the disciplinary sanctions don’t meet the wrong-doing by implicated officials.
“We are really concerned about the trend that we are seeing,” Mothibi said.
He made the observation during the meeting of the standing committee on public accounts when the government’s forensic investigative and litigation agency was briefing on its investigations at the UIF earlier this week.
The public purse watch body heard that the SIU investigated allegations of maladministration in the irregularly-awarded media buying tender where the UIF appointed five service providers for media campaigns during the Covid-19 pandemic and made R6.1 million payments.
National acting chief investigating officer, Zodwa Xesibe, said the media houses had submitted sole mandate letters stating they have a sole mandate to sell campaigns, airtime and to negotiate overall partnership on behalf of their radio stations.
“Their letters further indicated that they are not sole source service providers in the media industry, but within their media houses.
“Based on the letters sent to UIF by the five media houses, it became evident that that they did not regard themselves as sole source service providers but instead as having sole mandate in terms of their products,” Xesibe said.
She said the recommendation by the UIF's bid adjudication committee, in which members of the media houses described as sole service providers in the media space, was misleading and the payments made to the entities of R6 144 351.68 amounted to irregular expenditure.
“In the media there are many media houses that could provide the media services,” Xesibe said as she explained how the contract ended being a closed tender and awarded to the five companies.
Xesibe said based on the findings, the SIU referred evidence pointing towards misconduct against nine officials, ranged from assistant director up to the UIF commissioner.
Three of the officials were slapped with written warnings, three others received final written warnings and the remaining three were issued final written warnings and docking of a month’s salary.
No action was taken against the service providers after the SIU found that they had rendered the services and that the amount they charged was below the market rate.
“We could not find wrong on the entities. We could not falter them in the process so there was no referral for blacklisting,” Xesibe added.
ActionSA MP Alan Beesley expressed disbelief and frustration at the outcomes, highlighting a systematic issue within the government sector regards consequence management.
“It is a massive issue in the government sector. There is no consequence management,” Beesley said.
He charged that the Auditor-General and the SIU kept on highlighting the lack of consequence management.
“There are two reasons. People (presiding over the disciplinary hearings) have their own skeletons. There is no time to have independent disciplinary boards,” Beesley said.
Mothibi concurred with Beesley’s assessment regarding the failure to impose appropriate sanctions.
“The independence of the disciplinary proceedings, we agree, lends itself for consideration. We will single this out for engagement with the Department of Public Service and Administration and possible as part of the overall mechanism in the Presidency of monitoring implementation of the recommendations.
Mothibi said the independence of the disciplinary process should be looked into.
“There is a risk that we will continue to see this trend manifesting,” he warned.
Mothibi said in instances where they were dissatisfied with the outcome of the disciplinary process if the sanctions did not fit the seriousness of the offence, the SIU should consider exploring options to challenge the decisions legally.
“The option we have is to review the disciplinary process outcomes,” said Mothibi.
He noted with concern that the lesser sanctions imposed on officials were not confined to the UIF only.
“There are also other state institutions. In some institutions they go to the extent that they don’t agree with our recommendation to institute disciplinary hearing,” Mothibi said.
mayibongwe.maqhina@inl.co.za
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