The Department of State Expenditure is considering using=20 hi-tech methods to get to grips with the tricky task of=20 transforming its almost exclusively white male staff to=20 something more representative of all South Africans.
Director General Hannes Smit this week told the=20 parliamentary finance committee that he had been unable to=20 fill vacancies in his department because all posts had been=20 frozen until the 11 000 government posts advertised last=20 year as affirmative action posts had been filled.
Of these, 80 had been allocated to State Expenditure but=20 Smit believed that the whole issue had been tackled “in the=20 wrong way”, as few suitably qualified candidates had been=20
Given the shortage of black matriculants and graduates with=20 maths and science, that might be difficult. And since, as=20 Smit says, it takes two to three years to train a treasury=20 official, it might be well nigh impossible.
But Smit visited the Amalgamated Banks of South Africa=20 (ABSA) headquarters in Johannesburg this week and was=20 impressed by its Africa Growth Network training system=20 which allowed it to train its staff much more quickly and=20
ABSA rented a channel from M-Net and piped training=20 programmes into all its branches simultaneously, allowing=20 them to phone in to instructors if they had queries.
“We seriously considering introducing a similar system,”=20 Smit said. It would allow him to make black appointments at=20 junior levels and quickly train them up to the required=20
Smit told the committee 57,5 percent of his staff were=20 male, 20,7 percent were “people of colour” and the rest=20 white. Of the top staff, 98.6 percent were white.