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The Standing Committee on Public Accounts (Scopa) is concerned about the role that is being played by the company ICTworks in the Integrated Financial Management System (IFMS) at the National Treasury.

This company was initially contracted to do work on IFMS 1 and when IFMS 1 collapsed there was a settlement of R383m between ICTworks and the National Treasury for the contract and the company was requested to do some work on IFMS 2 to make up for the amount that they were given for IMFS 1. Scopa doesn’t understand what is the role of this company and the committee is looking forward to the forensic investigation report that will give answers to where the problems are when it comes to IFMS.

The committee also wants answers as to why there is no plan for IFMS 2 whereas ICTworks was all along contracted to develop a plan. It is also concerning that National Treasury is going to launch IFMS 2 in November 2018 whereas there is no plan. The Committee has requested the department to give detailed information in this regard. Scopa is also worried about the fact that there are no signed service level agreements with the State Information Technology Agency (Sita) on IFMS 2.

Scopa has requested the National Treasury to send written information to the Committee on why the department does not have a signed service level agreement with Sita on IFMS 2, particularly in light of the challenges that are currently experienced by Sita.

Scopa is also concerned about the fact that important documents on deviations and expansions do not contain the signature of the Chief Procurement Officer. An example that the Committee noted is that of the Chief Executive Officer of Transnet who requests deviations from the Director-General of the National Treasury and their fate is decided by a chief director whereas you have an important position of a Chief Procurement Officer.

This is concerning because after scrutinising some of the requests for deviations and expansions from departments and entities, Scopa noticed that most of the requests should not have been granted.

Scopa considers the National Treasury as its partner in ensuring that public funds are adequately accounted for and therefore expects the department to hold itself to a higher standard.
 

Issued by Parliamentary Communication Services on behalf of the Chairperson of Scopa, Themba Godi