Sicelo Shiceka has been restructuring his department (cooperative governance and traditional affairs) despite queries from the Department of Public Service and Administration (DPSA) about the changes.
Senior managers in the department say they have been “displaced” by the restructuring and he has told them they must reapply for their jobs.
The DPSA told the Mail & Guardian it did not have a problem with the restructuring but had asked for “technical changes” to Shiceka’s proposals which, among other things, related to proposed regional offices.
The M&G understands that some senior positions have been changed from permanent posts to three-year performance-based contracts, causing panic in the department.
Department spokesperson Dumisani Nkwamba told the M&G he was not aware that permanent employees had been asked to reapply for their jobs.
“We have not been informed that the posts that have always been occupied [by permanent] staff will now be filled with contract staff.”
The department said staff contracts could be changed only by “mutual consent”.
Shiceka submitted his restructuring plans in September last year to the department, which approved them on March 17.
But six days before that, he had told staff he was going ahead with his plans.
Members of the department told the M&G they were not consulted and were informed of the restructuring on March 12 — two days before the first batch of positions was advertised in a newspaper. Last week the department advertised more positions on eight pages of a Sunday newspaper.
The M&G understands top managers have to reapply for their positions; other staff will be repositioned according to the new structure.
Insiders said Shiceka conducted a “demographic survey” in which employees were asked where their hometown was and whether they would consider being redeployed from the national office.
“There is no department that hires people based on where they come from,” a senior manager observed.
Insiders believe Shiceka is hoping to purge employees from his predecessor Sydney Mufamadi’s era by getting them to agree to deployment away from the national office.
Shiceka’s spokesperson, Vuyelwa Vika, said the restructuring was necessary to achieve the department’s new mandate, though employees argued that this did not justify the scale of restructuring the minister was driving.
Vika said employees were in “transition” and were being referred to as “displaced” until they were placed in the new structure.
Where they would be deployed depended on how they fared in interviews when they reapplied for positions that many of them had occupied for years.