The Ministry for Performance Monitoring and Evaluation in The Presidency is pleased to present its first budget vote to Parliament. The presentation follows the allocation of a vote to the department from 1 April 2011. The department was proclaimed by President Jacob Zuma in January 2010 to enable a strong focus on performance monitoring and evaluation in government.
Since it was allocated a vote the department has presented its first strategic plan to parliament as required. The department under the leadership of Dr Sean Phillips as Director General has thus far met all the requirements to operate as a department.
Currently, the department has the necessary administrative capacity, systems, policies and processes required to comply with all the legal requirements which apply to a department. It has 113 positions, of which 75 have been filled and the remainders are in the process of being filled. The department is still rather small, but in terms of the current Medium Term Expenditure Framework (MTEF) budget allocations, the department should be in a position to double its number in the 2012/2013 financial year, to put in place the required capacity.
Since 2009, the department has put in place a range of initiatives to improve the performance of the state in line with its mandate. Guided by the Medium Term Strategic Framework (MTSF) the department developed 12 priority outcomes which were approved by Cabinet in January 2010. Detailed implementation plans or delivery agreements were finalised in November last year, and departments are now focused on implementation. The delivery agreements themselves are a major achievement – this is the first time that we have had outcome-oriented implementation plans which cut across government departments and spheres of government.
The President has also introduced an element of political accountability by signing performance agreements with his Ministers, committing them to delivering on the 12 outcomes. This political accountability is expected to cascade down into the administrative accountability system. These were made possible by the work done by the department. As stated in this department’s strategic plan, we are now working with departments to ensure that these priority outcomes are reflected in plans of all government departments and municipalities.These commitments will then also be reflected in the performance agreements of officials starting with Directors General, so that they are held to account for any failures and commended for successes.
The department since inception has had a number of achievements which includes;
- A Position Paper has been developed to guide government in implementing the outcomes approach and that this was the first step of performance monitoring and evaluation that the administration introduced.
- An Implementation Guide to put the Green Paper to action was developed.
- The signing of Performance Agreements between the President and Ministers.
- Delivery Agreements which are charters between the key stakeholders who need to work together to achieve the outcome have been finalised.
- The Terms of Reference and Guide for Outcomes Implementations Forums which are largely clusters and Ministers meetings with provincial MECs which are monitoring progress and submitting quarterly reports to Cabinet.
- The initiative by the department to develop a Management Performance Assessment Tool (PAT) together with other government departments e.g National Treasury, Public Service and Administration (DPSA), Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs (Cogta), Premiers' offices, etc. to enable objective performance assessments of individual departments and municipalities.
- The initiative to improve the Frontline Service Delivery which is the point at which people interface with government.
The implementation of our mandate also came with challenges:
- While we note that policy and programme adjustments of government are systematically being tackled to improve service delivery, it is in the interface at the point of service delivery at the local level that the problems most need unblocking.
- We still need to ensure that monitoring and evaluation approach is adopted as a management tool rather than as compliance check across all levels of government.
- The implementation of the outcomes approach still has to impact positively to the lives of our people.
- The department is still to build the requisite capacity to implement fully its mandate.
The Ministry and department are pleased with the progress we are making and we have definitely made great strides in the implementation of our work.
Enquiries:
Harold Maloka
Cell: 082 847 9799
E-mail: harold@po.gov.za or maloka.harold@gmail.com
