https://www.polity.org.za
Deepening Democracy through Access to Information
Home / News / South African News RSS ← Back
Africa|Business|Industrial|Systems
Africa|Business|Industrial|Systems
africa|business|industrial|systems
Close

Email this article

separate emails by commas, maximum limit of 4 addresses

Sponsored by

Close

Article Enquiry

Whistleblowing support systems must be implemented to drive improved culture, summit hears

Close

Embed Video

Whistleblowing support systems must be implemented to drive improved culture, summit hears

5th September 2024

By: Thabi Shomolekae
Creamer Media Senior Writer

ARTICLE ENQUIRY      SAVE THIS ARTICLE      EMAIL THIS ARTICLE

Font size: -+

To see improvements in whistleblowing, global law firm Eversheds Sutherland SA partner Kyle Lamb highlighted that structures and support systems must be implemented to assist whistleblowers.

Lamb was speaking during the University of Johannesburg's Anti-Corruption Summit, where he described the challenges whistleblowers faced.

Advertisement

The backdrop was former Chief Justice Raymond Zondo’s State Capture reports which implicated about 1 500 people in rampant looting and capture of South Africa’s State-owned enterprises.

Coca-Cola Africa general counsel Mpumi Mazibuko pointed out that a healthy whistleblowing culture was one of good governance that ensured leadership appreciated and understood ethics and compliances.

Advertisement

He said that for most people this sounded like “a bit of a drag”, because it took one’s eye off the bottom line and from driving sales.

“What is the cost here that is involved if you are seen acting unethically and the damage it can do on your brand,” he countered.

Leadership needed to realise that they needed to invest in systems and in people to drive the agenda.

He added that there were tools and platforms that could be harnessed to help drive compliance programmes.

“Yes, it can take your eye from what the core business is, but not paying attention to ethics and compliance issues can really be detrimental to your brand if you get caught up in the storm,” he warned.

The Ethics Institute specialist for ethics and anti-corruption Lulama Qabaka pointed out that South Africa had been doing whistleblowing wrong “for a very long time”, highlighting that this had been happening even before democracy.

Lamb, meanwhile, said compared to the private sector, the public sector was always in the media spotlight for corruption, saying this was owing to it being an affront to the citizenry who saw their taxpayer money wasted.

Mazibuko acknowledged this trust deficit between the citizenry, the State and civil society, noting that the prevalence of corruption in this spehere did not absolve other parties that had also practised corruption.

Gauteng Industrial Development Zone and Columbus Stainless nonexecutive director Nelisile Thanjekwayo said corruption was seen so often in the country that citizens had become numb to it.

She noted that nothing much had happened since the Zondo Commission.

“We found out all these facts, we found out all our [taxpayers’] money that was wasteful expenditure and we literally just continued . . . because we see it repeatedly,” she said.

She said it was important to have forums where discussions on measures to curb corruption took place, and said realistic actions must be taken to deal with corruption.

EMAIL THIS ARTICLE      SAVE THIS ARTICLE ARTICLE ENQUIRY

To subscribe email subscriptions@creamermedia.co.za or click here
To advertise email advertising@creamermedia.co.za or click here

Comment Guidelines

About

Polity.org.za is a product of Creamer Media.
www.creamermedia.co.za

Other Creamer Media Products include:
Engineering News
Mining Weekly
Research Channel Africa

Read more

Subscriptions

We offer a variety of subscriptions to our Magazine, Website, PDF Reports and our photo library.

Subscriptions are available via the Creamer Media Store.

View store

Advertise

Advertising on Polity.org.za is an effective way to build and consolidate a company's profile among clients and prospective clients. Email advertising@creamermedia.co.za

View options

Email Registration Success

Thank you, you have successfully subscribed to one or more of Creamer Media’s email newsletters. You should start receiving the email newsletters in due course.

Our email newsletters may land in your junk or spam folder. To prevent this, kindly add newsletters@creamermedia.co.za to your address book or safe sender list. If you experience any issues with the receipt of our email newsletters, please email subscriptions@creamermedia.co.za