Affairs P Mashatile following State of Province Address
22 February 2007
The Gauteng Shared Service Centre (GSSC) is well on course in contributing
to the vision of building a better Gauteng. Our mid-term report shows that we
have made considerable progress in Finance, Human Resources, Technology
Support, Procurement and Audit Services.
We are meeting our objective of contributing to efficiencies within
government, helping departments to focus on their core functions, reduce
duplications and leverage on the economies of scale.
Building an effecting and caring government
Contact Centre expansion
During this financial year, we will open a 150 seat contact centre in
Vereeniging, Sedibeng region. The project is part of our vision to contribute
to building skills for the Business Process Outsourcing industry; expand
capacity to deal with increased demand for government services.
This project will further enhance our status as a destination of choice for
businesses wanting to set up call centres in Gauteng. It will further
contribute to job creation, especially for the youth and help alleviate the
scourge of poverty.
Licence Booking
We reiterate our stated position that the issuing of licences is the
function of the Provincial Government. The Gauteng Shared Service Centre will
continue with the licence pre-booking function on behalf of the Department of
Public Transport, Roads and Works.
Plans are already at an advanced stage to put in place the following
improvements:
1. Booking terminals will be installed at all testing stations. There will
be a direct on-line linkage between the testing stations and the contact
centre. The contact centre continues to be the primary system.
2. We will also introduce the option of booking by SMS before the end of March
2007 as a secondary system.
3. Our determination to fight corruption remains unwavering. This we will do
by:
* eliminating preferential relationships between industry players,
particularly driving schools and officials at the testing stations
* accepting only electronic bookings
* ensuring that manual bookings are irregular and illegal.
Fighting corruption and fraud
Through the Gauteng Audit Services, we are helping Accounting Officers of
Gauteng Provincial Government departments in discharging their legislative
responsibilities of preventing and investigating incidents of fraud, corruption
and other crimes of dishonesty.
We are now facilitating fraud risk assessments for each department in the
province. The outcome of this process will form part of a scientific basis for
future reviews and updates of departmental Fraud Prevention Plans.
Our forensic investigations are carried out professionally without fear or
favour. We have reached a level of professionalism in our work such that the
quality of our reports is unparalleled. This can be attested by the confidence
we have in each investigation report issued. Our multi-skilled team of fraud
examiners remain enthusiastic when their work is successfully tested in
Departmental Enquiries and lately courts of law. We have reported previously
that we have recovered in excess of R29 million through our enhanced
systems.
Enabling Faster Economic growth
Broad Based Black Economic Empowerment (BBBEE)
In the coming financial year, we will undertake the process of establishing
a centrally administered database of service providers for the Gauteng
Provincial Government; this will be linked to the small, medium and
micro-enterprise (SMME) portal. The pre-qualification of vendors will be in
accordance with the generic scorecard.
All suppliers will be required to submit a BBBEE verification certificate
from an accredited verification agency for input into the system. Until such
time as agencies are accredited, suppliers may use GSSC and Department of
Public Works approved verification agencies or those who are members of the
Association of BEE Verification Agencies (ABVA).
GSSC and the Department of Public Works will advertise annually for
enterprises to submit their information. No suppliers will be utilised by any
department or agency of the GPG unless they have been verified and form part of
the GPG databases.
The databases will assist those evaluating suppliers and administering
contracts in verifying the bona-fides of suppliers. It will record a supplier's
BBBEE status, whether it is a micro, small, medium or large enterprise, its
sector of activity or commodity and, where feasible, information on suppliers'
technical competency and quality.
In partnership with the Gauteng Enterprise Propeller and the Gauteng Youth
Commission, we will focus on providing training for companies owned by women
and young people. We will also target high value contracts in areas such as
Information Technology (IT), medical and professional services for allocation
to companies owned by people with disabilities, the youth and women.
As part of accelerating growth, especially in the SMME sector, suppliers
with recurring payment problems have been identified and supported by means of
on-site reconciliations at GSSC. Payments are now processed within two days of
receipt of all relevant documentation. All our initiatives are geared towards
adding impetus in the task of building a better Gauteng.
The Provincial Treasury
As we said before, the Provincial Treasury will continue to support both
provincial departments and local government in the management of their funds.
We will monitor the implementation and compliance with the Public Finance
Management Act and the Municipal Finance Management Act (MFMA). As the Premier
said: "our goal is to increase the number of departments who receive
unqualified audits. Over time we will strive for clean audits in all
departments."
Over the last year Gauteng Treasury recorded numerous successes with the
implementation of the Municipal Finance Management Act. Treasury managed to
successfully spearhead the implementation of the MFMA in the nine delegated
municipalities across Gauteng. All the budgets for the nine delegated
municipalities were tabled on time and in accordance with the newly legislated
municipal budget formats.
In addition to the Gauteng Treasury being responsible for assisting
municipalities with developing Integrated Development Plans and credible
budgets, our plans going forward are to place more emphasis on issues of
Financial Governance. We will therefore be expanding our responsibilities to
concentrate more on assisting municipalities with executing their
responsibilities on the following:
* Risk Management
* Asset Management
* Internal Audit or Audit Committees
* Financial Accounting
* General Information Systems.
We are doing all of these things as part of our overall commitment to make
local government work better.
Work will also continue to strengthen the capacity in the offices of Chief
Financial Officers in all departments. We remain committed to building an
efficient government as part of our contribution to the objective of building a
better Gauteng.
Thank you.
For more information contact:
Percy Mthimkhulu
Cell: 082 379 1913
Issued by: Department of Finance and Economic Affairs, Gauteng Provincial
Government
22 February 2007
