Government intelligence agencies plan to launch an investigation into 'instability' at State-owned enterprises (SOEs), the Sunday Independent reported.

State Security Minister Siyabonga Cwele told the Sunday newspaper: "we are having all sorts of challenges with our parastatals...we will try to investigate why they are unstable".

"Some of the issues have to do with governance. We are not trying to direct departments on how to do their work, ours is to say these are critical parastatals, how do we make sure they operate optimally?"

He added: "What is quite clear in government is that sometimes we open these structures and we never close them... and we end up with structures that do the same thing...

"And because they are using government resources they start competing and fighting and causing all sorts of problems among themselves. So those are the things we are looking (at)...Some of them may need rationalisation."

Senior African National Congress (ANC) Member of Parliament and chairperson of Parliament's public enterprises committee Vytjie Mentor told the newspaper that the disciplinary process involving suspended Chief Executive of Transnet Freight Rail's Siyabonga Gama - accused of flouting tender processes - was "too long and protracted...

"Justice delayed is justice denied."

Mentor also told the newspaper that there were problems with transformation in SOE's.

"On transformation, numerous official and unofficial reports have been made about SOE's being slaughter houses for black managers.

"Parliament must still listen to the cries of marginalisation of black managers in the [public enterprises] department and in SOE's" said Mentor.

Parastatals including Eskom and Transnet have been involved with various governance disputes.

Ex-Eskom Chief Executive Jacob Maroga recently had his dismissal ruled as unfair by the Johannesburg High Court.

The court had also ruled that Maroga could not prevent Eskom's board from naming a successor.

Maroga was fired by the Eskom board in November 2009 after he denied that he had offered to resign from the parastatal.

Democratic Alliance state security shadow minister Theo Coetzee said that it was not the State Security ministry's place to investigate the SOE's.

"It is not the job of the intelligence services to be investigating how well public servants are doing their job.

"It has nothing to do with state security or anything which in any way can be legitimately seen as falling into the ambit of the intelligence services."