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5th March 2021

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Award-winning columnist, Bhekisisa Mncube, tells President Cyril Ramaphosa: ‘The entire state machinery is broken — fire the lot.’

Mr President, I am in fine fettle this week. So much so, I wanted to forgo writing my weekly letter to you and head out to the local drinking hole, but I thought better of it. Well sort of!

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The truth is I am offline. In any event, you refuse to engage with this lowly paid newspaperman with the ego the size of Russia. Mr President, this week in your letter, “From the desk of the President”, you waxed lyrical about building an efficient, capable and ethical state free from corruption. Really? You did admit though, that, “all too often, people have been hired and promoted to key positions for which they are neither suitable nor qualified”. In your own words, this affects government performance and contributes to nepotism, political interference in the work of departments, lack of accountability, mismanagement and corruption.

To fix all this, you’re going to professionalize the public service and teach the old dogs new tricks. Njani? In other words, the National School of Government becomes the panacea of all public-service ills. Clearly, you’re of a weak spine. The public service is holding the country to ransom while you’re dilly-dallying. Truth be told, most civil servants are hired because of their proximity to people with political power. In a similar vein, most are promoted beyond their competence and qualifications. This is not to say there are just a few rotten apples. No! No! The entire state machinery is broken. The whole shebang is offline. It needs a complete overhaul. Put differently, you need to fire the whole lot and rehire only those fit for purpose.

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At no cost to the taxpayer, Mr President, let me tell you the truth about the true state of affairs when it comes to government services. The words that hold back the magical six-percent economic growth in SA are: “we are offline”. The phrase “we are offline” is the civil servants’ (of all hues) most used phrase in SA.

The second most used: “We don’t accept card payments.” If I’ve heard that once, I’ve heard it 100 times. Not to be outdone, your low-ranking officials, Mr President, are wont to say with pride: “I am on lunch.” This typically happens between 11.30 am and 2 pm, and by 3.30 pm the whole state machinery, especially the client-serving units, closes shop. The cliché becomes: “Come back tomorrow.” The least used words are: “please”, and “I am sorry”.

The most bizarre thing is that the government departments that require certified documents do not have designated commissioners of oaths. Why? The refrain is: “We don’t satisfy (sic) documents here.” This means all of us must queue at the nearest cop shop. You know what, Mr President, the police officers don’t even bother to look at the documents anymore and verify if they are authentic replicas of the originals. The sheer length of the snaking queues at police stations waiting for the magical stamp is nothing short of madness.

The state of brokenness is far-reaching. Let me illustrate. The reality is that very few people are prosecuted in SA for driving while intoxicated because of the government laboratory services’ ineptitude. The estimated time to process all currently unprocessed blood-alcohol test samples stands at an average of 11 months. As a result, most Magistrate Courts routinely dismiss the driving under the influence cases, for lack of evidence. Even more horrifying is that the police forensic evidence backlog stands at over 170 000 cases. The backlog of toxicology reports at the Department of Health stands at 28 181 samples, and 7 889 of these test results have been outstanding for more than 10 years. This alone undermines the country’s criminal justice system.

Alarmingly, Home Affairs Minister Aaron Motsoaledi says his department hopes to eliminate the backlog of refugee status appeals within four years. That means that for 48 months, millions of people will remain stateless and thus not accounted for anywhere.

As for productivity, it is a joke. At Prasa, some 17 000 employees account for a 17% productivity level, the Parliament’s Standing Committee on Public Accounts heard this week. At Eskom in 2004, the company produced 232 443 GWh of electricity with 31 475 employees. Fast forward 15 years, and Eskom is now producing 218 939 GWh with 46 665 employees. This means that the power generation per employee declined from 7,39 GWh in 2004 to a current level of 4,69 GWh. Should I go on?

I think you get the picture. The whole thing is broken. Let’s auction government services to the highest bidder like uBaba did. Food for thought! Till next week my man. “Send me.”

This Letter to Mahlamba Ndlopfu is written by Bhekisisa Mncube a former senior Witness political journalist, the 2020 regional winner in the Opinion category of the Vodacom Journalist of the Year Award, and author of The Love Diary of a Zulu Boy, a memoir. This opinion piece was first published in the Witness (News24).

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