FINANCIAL RESULTS REFLECT OVERALL STATE OF ACCOUNTABILITY AND TRANSPARENCY

Adv Johan Kruger, Director: Centre for Constitutional Rights

The Constitution enshrines a system of democratic governance that must result in accountability, responsiveness and openness. As such, the government, its officials and its institutions must be able to explain and justify its decisions, actions and laws; be accessible and responsive; and conduct its business of governance in an open and transparent manner. There are a number ways to test accountability, responsiveness and openness – including through Parliament and the Courts. The annual financial audit by the Auditor-General is another objective mechanism to measure the very basics of accountability and transparency. These include assessing financial performance in terms of internationally accepted accounting principles, but also overall performance, service delivery and systemic irregularities.

The Auditor-General, in his recent consolidated national and provincial government audit results for 2011/12, found that only 22% of all government institutions achieved clean audit opinions in the past financial year – only 117 out of 536 government institutions. Of these institutions, 14% received qualified audit opinions, 3% received adverse opinions or disclaimers and 6% have outstanding audit reports due to non-submission of financial statements. The amounts in question are equally staggering: unauthorised expenditure amounting to R2.97 billion, irregular expenditure totalling R28.38 billion (R6.25 billion more than the previous year) and fruitless and wasteful expenditureadding up to R1.79 billion – an astounding total of R 33.16 billion worth of misappropriation.

These disconcerting facts were well reported and require no further analysis. The latest results are, however, not only indicative of the state of governance and financial management in public administration and the public service, but are also symptomatic of the government’s increasing overall failure to adhere to the constitutional values of accountability, responsiveness and openness. It stands to reason that if only 22% of government departments, institutions and enterprises received a clean audit, 78% of all government entities are in one way or another failing to be accountable, responsive and transparent in their dealings. The latter certainly warrants some additional contemplation.

Who is to blame? The President, as head of the executive, is responsible – together with the rest of his Cabinet – for the conduct of the government, its officials and its institutions. The President appoints the Deputy President and Ministers, assigns their powers and functions, and ought to dismiss them should they fail to perform or fail to act in accordance with the Constitution and the law. The President assigns and delegates powers and functions, but cannot abdicate his responsibility as head of the executive. In addition, the President and his Cabinet are, collectively and individually, accountable to Parliament for the exercise of their powers and the performance of their functions – including the conduct of public servants working under their direction. The same, of course, holds true for Premiers and their respective provincial executives in relation to their provincial governments. The President and the rest of the Cabinet must therefore take responsibility for any failure of government officials and institutions to perform their functions effectively – whether it is the most junior government official or a giant public enterprise.

President Zuma, however, seems to claim ignorance in most instances when government actions, expenditure and finances are mentioned or discussed. His recent response in Parliament to questions regarding the R250 million being spent on his private residence at Nkandla, is a case in point:  “If the Honourable Member thinks that I must know the accounting books of a department and count figures, I think she is demanding a lot from me. I don’t know the figures because it is not my job to do that“. It may not be the President’s job to do the bookkeeping, but he certainly has a responsibility to know the “figures” – especially if such expenditure amounts to millions in tax money being spent on his private residence.

Ministers are not doing any better. In this regard, the Auditor-General asserted that the root cause of material findings on non-compliance with laws and regulations related to insufficient oversight and monitoring of compliance, as well as the lack of “leadership (the accounting officer and/or executive authority)” in setting the “appropriate tone when it comes to compliance“. According to the Auditor-General, “accountability is not accepted and the leadership does not apply the remedies available in legislation to ensure that there are consequences for transgressions“. It appears that Ministers are failing to lead and take responsibility for their institutions’ accountability. In this regard, the Auditor-General found that 74% of state institutions failed to fully comply with laws and regulations, and that key departments responsible for national outcomes, such as those in the health, education and human settlement sectors, continue to have material shortcomings in reporting on service delivery. Accordingly, based on the annual performance reports, 42% of state institutions achieved 80% or less of their planned service delivery targets.

This was certainly not news for the President and the Cabinet. Following the release of the Auditor-General’s report, the Minister in the Presidency for Performance Monitoring and Evaluation, Collins Chabane, stated that the findings of the Auditor-General were consistent with an assessment of 103 departments carried out by his own department the previous year. Why then have the President and his Cabinet still failed to act in rectifying the deficiencies over the past year – or years for that matter? Moreover, the President’s unwillingness to dismiss or even discipline Ministers who fail to lead their departments, waste taxpayers’ money and fall short of service delivery targets, remains a mystery. Perhaps living in a glass house makes it tricky to throw stones at others?

The President and his Cabinet’s failure to own up to the financial and service delivery shortcomings are also reflected in the state of public administration in general. Section 195 of the Constitution requires public administration to be governed by the democratic values and principles enshrined in the Constitution. These include, among others, the promotion and maintenance of “a high standard of professional ethics“, the promotion of “efficient, economic and effective use of resources” and an “accountable” public administration, which must provide “the public with timely, accessible and accurate information” in order to foster “transparency“. The public service is failing most, if not all, of these requirements and in doing so, falling short of the founding values of accountability, responsiveness and openness. In October 2011, Willie Hofmeyr, then head of the Special Investigating Unit (SIU) (responsible for investigating corruption in the Public Service) told Parliament that between R25 billion and R30 billion of the Government’s annual procurement budget alone was lost to corruption, incompetence and negligence in the public service. Two years later, the SIU is still without a head and the public service – according to the Auditor-General – may be going from bad to worse.

The President and Ministers are quick to blame their respective departments and institutions, although a good workman should not be blaming his or her tools. Various reasons, ranging from “cadre deployment” and incompetence, to outright dishonesty and corruption have resulted in a public service which fails to deliver. The blame for this state of affairs undoubtedly belongs to the President and his Cabinet, who individually and collectively have been failing to manage public administration according to constitutional requirements. When not hiding behind bureaucracy, political rhetoric, half-baked secrets and the National Key Points Act, pre-1994 politicians seem to be the most obvious scapegoats. The Auditor-General’s findings – at least in broad strokes – seem to be telling it as it is: the Government is for the most part not accountable, responsive and open; the President and his Cabinet are individually and collectively failing to take responsibility for the failures of those who they are supposed to be managing; and the public service lacks objective, competent and trustworthy civil servants.

Public Service and Administration Minister, Lindiwe Sisulu, has indeed indicated that the Public Service Act will be amended to ban public servants from doing business with the government and benefiting from state contracts. The Minister must be commended for her decision – even though it is about 18 years overdue. Whether this ban will also result in corrupt public servants being prosecuted – as opposed to only being disciplined and dismissed – is yet to be seen. It is certainly also time to revise the controversial “Ministerial Handbook” and all other policies allowing for exorbitant spending on luxuries and high-flying lifestyles of politicians and public servants – all while basic services cannot be delivered to a majority of South Africans due to “budget constraints”.

It is, of course, impossible to even consider government accountability if the public’s right to know – to access information – is restricted, increasingly so “in the interests of national security”. This is especially true when it relates to public spending and administration. Despite footing the bill for every cent being wasted, taxpayers are, in a number of instances, kept in the dark about how their money is being spent. What we do know, are the facts reported by the Auditor-General. Facts that, in themselves, are a reason for concern. Only time (and of course the Auditor-General’s next report) will tell whether the President and his Cabinet are intent on living up to the values of our constitutional democracy, or whether they have merely been paying lip service to the constitutional promise to maintain a government that is accountable, responsive and transparent.