Durban – The Department of Public Works in KwaZulu-Natal is coughing up over R2 million a year to a private consultant who works as a compliance officer, providing support to head of department Dr Gaster Sharpley, despite having over 20 senior permanent officials to provide the same services.
This has angered department officials who felt it was a waste of taxpayers’ money and a total disregard for Premier Sihle Zikalala’s call to exercise austerity by cutting down on unnecessary use of consultants.
The Daily News has obtained official documents containing details of a three-year contract between MEC Peggy Nkonyeni’s department and Quinton Williams Consulting PTY (Ltd), which is originally from East London.
Department spokesperson Kiru Naidoo said Nkonyeni approved Williams’ contract because when Sharpley took over the head of department (HOD) position he had to improve the compliance unit, which was by then headed by a deputy director, “a relatively low-level post for this function”.
Provincial Standing Committee on Public Accounts chairperson Maggie Govender has also ruled out the necessity of Williams’ contract, saying the department has capable staff to do almost everything he is contracted to do.
Williams won the tender, which was advertised after Sharpley had written to the department’s chief financial officer, Jeremy Redfearn, requesting that a person with “professional skills and expertise, particularly in the legal, finance and compliance fields” be hired to work under him for a 36-month period.
According to the service agreement, Williams started working with the department on February 1 last year and his contract will end on January 31 next year.
He is charging the department R1 239 an hour or R9 912 a day.
Williams’ required services to the department include providing administrative support to project management teams in the regions, and ensuring compliance and verification of delegations, as well as support to the department on strategic matters, and dealing with all emails that impact on matters of compliance.
He has also been tasked with reviewing the performance agreement of SMS (senior management service) and aligning it to the MEC’s policy speech.
Some department officials said these functions could be performed cheaper by internal officials as they have the required skills and qualifications.
Initially Williams had requested an annual payment of R2 180 640, excluding tax, but he later settled for between R2 100 000 and R2 130 000.
Williams had said in a letter he wrote to the department to accept the appointment that he deserved the payment because he was earning “close to R2 million per annum” before he moved to Public Works.
“What is concerning is that he is working from the HOD’s office and using the department’s resources. The HOD is doing almost nothing except putting a signature on what has been done by Williams,” the source said.
But Naidoo said Sharpley’s busy schedule included attending meetings of the cabinet’s infrastructure sub-committee, of which he is chairperson, and meetings of various portfolio committees. Another government official said despite the national and provincial governments’ numerous calls for cutting down on non-essential expenditure it was still common for provincial departments to outsource work that should be done internally. There are government communicators who have skills and equipment such as cameras and video cameras but an outsider would be contracted to take photos and charge R500 000.
“Government has its own graphic designers but an outsider would be given a tender to develop a website for huge payment,” said another source.
Govender said departments are only allowed to contract consultants for specialised skills not available within the government.
“If it’s like the MEC’s speech and all that, then they should just hire a speech writer. “There are full-time communicators who should assist in speech writing. Public Works as the big department has a supply chain management section, and a legal department whose staffs are assigned to deal with contracts. Then why would they want to appoint a consultant when they already have people like that?” asked Govender.
When contacted, Williams referred questions to the department’s communicators, saying: “In terms of my SLA (service level agreement), all correspondence relating to my services to the department must go via formal channels in terms of my confidentiality clause.”
Naidoo said by bringing in a consultant, Sharpley wanted to improve the functioning of his office. He wanted to improve was the protection of SCM and human resources sensitive information, which was previously being leaked to “unauthorised third parties” to the detriment of the department’s operation.
“The independent company offers all the functions required cost-effectively under the current austerity measures and DPSA (Department of Public Service and Administration) guidelines,” said Naidoo.
Zikalala’s spokesperson Lennox Mabaso said: “We don’t have details about it, and we have asked for more.”
Daily News