PRETORIA, June 23 (ANA) – Transport Minister Joe Maswanganyi on Friday outlined several turnaround strategies at State-owned enterprises (SOEs) under his portfolio, hoping that the reforms capacitate the entities to drive a developmental agenda and cut corruption.
“Moving forward, with South Africa aspiring to be a developmental State, we are envisioning a framework for our SOEs reforms and optimal contribution to equitable growth, development, transformation, and service delivery in South Africa,” Maswanganyi told reporters in Pretoria.
Listing the long list of reforms, which include improving financial analysis, assessing performance based on efficiency and effectiveness as well as service delivery, harmonising remuneration principles, policies and practices across the SOEs to ensure competitiveness and optimum retention of personnel, and improving transport SOEs collaboration and coordination, Maswanganyi said the fight against crime within these State institutions is high on the agenda.
“In implementing all these reforms, we remain committed to fight against all forms of crime and corruption. National government has introduced and promoted various pieces of key legislation such as the Protected Disclosures Act, Promotion of Access to Information Act, Financial Intelligence Centre Act, Promotion of Administrative Justice Act and the Prevention and Combating of Corrupt Activities Act in order to deal with criminality,” said Maswanganyi.
“As the department of transport, we are going to establish a strong institutional capacity to complement the basic investigative work, in collaboration with such institutions such as the Public Protector, the National Prosecuting Authority, the Special Investigating Unit, the Public Service Commission, the Financial Intelligence Centre and the Auditor-General. These institutions, individually and collectively, are reaching levels of maturity and efficiency that have provided the country with strong anti-corruption capacity.”
In terms of corporate governance, Maswanganyi said the SOEs under his custodianship have already advertised all the vacant positions on its boards.
During the question and answer session, Maswanganyi however faced a barrage of questions over the current performance of SOEs, many of which struggling financially and getting bailouts from the State perennially.
He responded: “We can take for instance Sanral. It is doing a lot to bring transformation but more still needs to be done to make sure that they are more black contractors who participate in Sanral’s programmes of road construction. In the aviation sector, there are very few blacks who are participating in that sector. It’s a fact. We need more blacks, women, youth and people with disability. The same with the maritime [sector]”.
“I don’t know what is disingenuous about telling our people the facts. We are here to account. We are serious about these turnaround strategies to make sure that the institutions are fully functional, efficient and effectively.”
– African News Agency
