The Commission for Gender Equality (CGE), is in such a chaotic state that it should be placed under “mentorship”, recommends a report by independent auditors.
The diagnostic report on the gender body, conducted by an independent company with expertise in gender issues, Four Rivers, calls for the government’s Public Administration Leadership and Management Academy (Palama) to take over the running of the commission until its leaders are ready to run the institution.
The project leader of the diagnostic audit, Mohau Pheko, told the Mail & Guardian that it was important that the commission be placed under administration because “there is no culture of gender work in that organisation. In fact, there is no organisation at all”.
The CGE has been dogged by conflict between staff and management since its inception, prompting the resignation of several commissioners and leaders. Pheko insisted that the Three Rivers report was handed to the commission’s organisational development committee and commissioners. On Thursday the commission denied seeing the final audit report, claiming that the last copy it had seen, in 2008, was “merely a draft”.
Spokesperson Javu Baloyi said the commission could not discuss something it had not received. “I wish we [were] privy to the report,” Baloyi said. “The CGE cannot implement the recommendations it doesn’t have”.
Baloyi said the little the commission knew about the final report was in the form of email exchanges between its former chief executive, David Setshedi, and Four Rivers.
“They didn’t yield the desirable results, as Four Rivers failed to submit the report as requested.”
The audit report found that political principals charged with overseeing the commission should also carry the blame for the mess at the Chapter Nine institution.
It charged that former ministers of justice and constitutional development, the National Assembly and the auditor general should have sounded alarm bells and taken radical action to move the commission on to the right course.
“We believe that there is culpability at several levels,” it says. “This is a serious allegation; however very little has been said in previous reviews about the role the principals have played in colluding around a veil of silence and negligence and contributing to the state of affairs.”
However, the justice department confirmed that former justice minister Enver Surty had received the Four Rivers report and, in a bid to help the commission, had seconded his department’s chief director of budgets, Johan Johnson, to act as its CEO last year.
Johnson acted for six months. Justice department spokesperson Tlali Tlali said he had introduced “measures intended to salvage the CGE”.
Tlali said the department’s intervention could not fully run its course because the commission was transferred to Noluthando Mayende-Sibiya’s ministry for women, children, and people with disabilities.
Pheko said for the commission to start functioning effectively, an “entirely new team” of leaders should be brought in.
“Most of the people in the commission are not skilled to do the job, which is unfortunately what is wrong about political appointments. You’ve got people who do not care about gender issues.”
Criticism
In his 2007 report on Chapter Nine institutions, ANC veteran Kader Asmal criticised the commission for its failure to understand its legal and constitutional mandate.
Four Rivers investigators conducted 121 interviews with current and former commissioners, staff, external stakeholders and media practitioners with gender expertise.
It found that there was lack of agreement about a discourse and framework that had caused confusion in the interpretation of gender, in turn weakening the commission’s impact.
Public perception of the commission was poor, the report said. “The CGE’s public face is one of constant infighting and a poor example of a brand that delivers on the promotion of gender equality.”
The commission remained an organisation in “disarray [with] mismatched human resource capacity; poor programme design and fragmented leadership at the commissioner level; poor non-compliant financial systems resulting in a disclaimer in the audit report; centralised hierarchal management systems and practice [and] stagnant programme activities — [it is] at a crisis point,” the report said.
Four Rivers recommends that the commission be given “strong assistance” to rebuild and turn around the organisation with Palama’s mentorship, and that it should recruit a skilled CEO and a chief financial officer to ensure accountability.
The commission is currently being run by an acting CEO, Keketso Maema, and acting chief financial officer Moshabi Putu. All its departments have acting heads.
The positions have been vacant since 2008.