Provinces told to have fewer admin staff
Financial problems prompt closer scrutiny of how provinces are run
Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan has called for sweeping changes to be made in the way provinces are run.
Delivering his 2012/13 Budget in the National Assembly on Wednesday, he said several lessons had been learned from the government's recent intervention in three cash-strapped provinces.
"During the past year, it has been necessary to take steps to address financial management weaknesses that have undermined service delivery and put financial sustainability at risk in several provinces," Gordhan said.
"There are several lessons of general application from these interventions."
The lessons included reducing administrative staff in favour of teachers, nurses and service delivery personnel; improving financial management capability across national and provincial departments; and, the need for stricter oversight of supply chain management processes.
Gordhan also called for "better procedures" to be implemented to ensure that provinces did not appoint staff without budget allocations.
"We shall continue to work hard at building institutions and systems where weaknesses have been identified. We must do this in order to restore the trust of our people in our capacity to govern," he said.
Provincial government also needed stronger rules to ensure that legitimate creditors were paid within the legally prescribed 30-day period.
"We need to reduce administrative staff in favour of frontline teaching, nursing and service delivery personnel. We need to improve financial management capability across national and provincial departments. We need stricter oversight of supply chain management processes," Gordhan said.
Mthondowethusi
Wher wil de teachers teach = under treesWil de nurses work at de deladedating hospitals?
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MAARKENG-JANONG
I 100% agree with you Mr Gordahn. There a lot of warm bodies in the Provincial Departments who are doing absolutely nothing but earning hefty salaries; more especially the so-called PA's.Report Abuse
Sizwe_M
And who will administer the payments of those staff and front-line personnel. Who will allocate budgets for those schools and hospitals, who will be responsible for SCM within those departments! Mr Godhan you dropped the ball on this one, you need "support" staff just as much as those front-line workers, as you have seen nurses are useless without administrators to supply their hospitals and the same can be said for schools and teachers. And if you believe that teachers can moonlight as administrators go to local government and look at what they do when they become Municipal managers, and administrators!!Report Abuse
Rakgadi-Tabeya
This is nonsense, no organisation can function without administrators. These people are the ones that run the business. EG. Check one Manager who does not want to learn how to make a copy or even operate a fax machine how frustrated he becomes when his/her assistant is not there. Bullshit Godhan what you are saying, remember di background tsa batho ha di tshwane, they could have taken those "important courses" if situation at home ene e dumela but he/she did anything that cud put bread on the table. Sies nxa this is discrimination at its best - le undermina batho yerrrReport Abuse
PapaT
Thanks to the Minister for such hogwash. Where on earth ,except in South Africa of course, can you run a system of governance without administrative staff. Now we know why govenment departments like Educaction in the provinces are over populated by teachers who know nothing about administration. It is no wonder their systems are chaotic, they are utilising wrong people to carry out the mandate of the department. Let teachers teach and administrators administrateReport Abuse