Decisive development has been achieved in the public service, but more challenges lie ahead, President Thabo Mbeki said in Pretoria on Friday.
”We can be greatly proud of what we have taken on and how much we have achieved. But as ever, the better we do, the more the next challenges and problems are thrown into sharp relief,” he said at the opening of the Public Administration Leadership and Management Academy (Palama), in honour of freedom fighter Zachariah Keodirelang (ZK) Matthews.
Palama is essentially a training facility for public servants.
Mbeki said Palama, while an acronym, is also a Sesotho word meaning ”ascend” or ”get on board”.
”It is indeed an invitation to a quarter of a million public-service managers, across all three spheres of governments, to lift their performance and enhance the ‘Batho Pele’ ethos of service delivery, by taking advantage of the opportunities for management development that Palama makes available directly through its collaborators,” he said.
Palama is building on the contributions and successes of the South African Management Development Institute (Samdi).
Regulating public services
Public Service and Administration Minister Geraldine Fraser-Moleketi said Samdi will be replaced by Palama, as officially announced in the Government Gazette on Friday.
She said Palama will increase and accelerate management development and training, to improve the ethos of public service and to move towards a single public service.
She said the intention is not to amend the Constitution regarding the division of resources among all three tiers of government, but to bring about ”greater alignment” within the government. ”Inter-relatedness and collaboration is seen in reality through the delivery of services.”
Fraser-Moleketi said her department has submitted a draft to Parliament of a framework to provide public services across the spheres. ”We shouldn’t have a situation where people say, ‘I don’t want to live in the North West because of the services,”’ she said.
Public services need to be regulated across all provinces and each citizen has a right to the same services.
She said skills development in the government will help bring this about, and the institution will play a role in doing this. However, Palama will not replace tertiary institutions in training public servants, but will play a collaborative role. ”It is not in isolation of the higher tertiary environment,” she said.
Bust unveiled
The end of the opening was marked by the unveiling of a bust of Matthews. The sculpture, created by Noria Mabasa, one of South Africa’s most famous sculptors and a member of the Order of the Baobab, captures a smiling Matthews holding up his left thumb.
Mbeki told the gathering, which included three generations of the Matthews family — including his son Joe and granddaughter Education Minister Naledi Pandor — that it was an honour to open the institute that bore the proud name of ZK Matthews.
”We trust that all who graduate from Palama will be inspired by the example set by ZK Matthews — to value knowledge, public service and devotion to principle, and at all times remain fearless in their commitment to democracy and the vision of a non-racial, non-sexist and just society.”
He said Matthews was an illustrious freedom fighter and an outstanding academic. He also developed the Freedom Charter with its core principles enshrined in the Constitution.
”This is an additional linkage from Professor Matthews to our event today [Friday] — from the charter he initiated to our Constitution and the obligations it implies for public servants,” said Mbeki. — Sapa