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BusinessLive writes that it is a criminal offence for public servants to conduct business with organs of the state or to be a director of a company conducting business with any organ of the state. But, the number of officials caught doing so seemingly doesn’t scratch the surface of the extent of corruption in the state.
If found guilty, officials can be liable to a fine or imprisonment for up to five years, or both, and an offence may also result in the termination of employment. As at the end of April, the Department of Public Service & Administration (DPSA) found that of the about 1.3-million public servants (excluding local government), 1,539 were possibly conducting business with the state (428 from national departments and 1,111 from provincial departments). According to the DPSA’s Salomon Hoogenraad-Vermaak, who provided the figures to MPs on Wednesday, this represented an increase of 471 over the 1,068 employees found to be possibly conducting business with the state as at February 2019. DPSA Deputy Minister Sindisiwe Chikunga stressed the department’s commitment to take employees suspected of conducting business with the state to court to send a strong message. But, Rory Voller, Commissioner of the Companies and Intellectual Property Commission (CIPC), told MPs that a loophole existed in identifying government employees doing business with the state in that the CIPC only registered details of directors and not shareholders of companies. A public servant could be the ultimate beneficiary of a contract but not be registered as a director.
- Read the full original of the informative report in the above regard by Linda Ensor at BusinessLive
Get other news reports at the SA Labour News home page