LINDIWE Sisulu, the minister of public service and administration since June, has given notice of a shake up in the civil service.
Sisulu has a mixed record in previous portfolios of housing and defence, but she has established a reputation as a tough administrator who pursues her goals with vigour.
In briefings last week, Sisulu previewed a range of new measures to make public servants more accountable for their work and to tackle the culture of corruption that sees many doing private business with their own state employer.
She promised an unconditional ban on civil servants doing business with the government in any form and said there would be a 12- month cooling off period for people who leave state employment before they can take up government tenders.
Her first obstacle is going to be the formidable South African Democratic Teachers’ Union, Sadtu, which already has vowed to oppose closer monitoring of teachers.
Sisulu said she plans to send inspectors back into the schools, a promise made but not implemented by President Jacob Zuma. She has also supported plans for a biometric attendance register which will use fingerprints to log teachers into and out of work every day.
She has even said she will introduce a dress code so that, as she put it, teachers look like teachers.
Within two weeks, Sisulu plans to present a public service charter that will commit civil servants to be civil and to serve. There also will be no second chance under her new regime for public servants who have once been fired for fraud, mismanagement or misconduct.
Sisulu is not the first minister to make promises like these, but she has repeated them again and again over the past few days so perhaps she is more serious than others have been about her plans.
She has been around the ANC block often enough to know she will have a hard fight on her hands.
Sadtu, which already has threatened to shut down the schools if the minister of basic education, Angie Motshekga, does not resign, probably will not hesitate to ruin another school year if Sisulu goes ahead with her plans.
She will need the steel that allowed Maggie Thatcher to win her showdown with the miners’ unions if she is to overcome the obstructionism of Sadtu.
Other measures she has announced will break the chain of cadre enrichment and also will be vehemently opposed by some of her party colleagues.
If she is clever, resolute and successful, Sisulu will do a service to all South Africans. If she blinks, she will leave us untangling the mess of another unfulfilled promise.
We wish her well.
Sisulu must not blink
Sisulu has a mixed record in previous portfolios of housing and defence, but she has established a reputation as a tough administrator who pursues her goals with vigour.
In briefings last week, Sisulu previewed a range of new measures to make public servants more accountable for their work and to tackle the culture of corruption that sees many doing private business with their own state employer.
She promised an unconditional ban on civil servants doing business with the government in any form and said there would be a 12- month cooling off period for people who leave state employment before they can take up government tenders.
Her first obstacle is going to be the formidable South African Democratic Teachers’ Union, Sadtu, which already has vowed to oppose closer monitoring of teachers.
Sisulu said she plans to send inspectors back into the schools, a promise made but not implemented by President Jacob Zuma. She has also supported plans for a biometric attendance register which will use fingerprints to log teachers into and out of work every day.
She has even said she will introduce a dress code so that, as she put it, teachers look like teachers.
Within two weeks, Sisulu plans to present a public service charter that will commit civil servants to be civil and to serve. There also will be no second chance under her new regime for public servants who have once been fired for fraud, mismanagement or misconduct.
Sisulu is not the first minister to make promises like these, but she has repeated them again and again over the past few days so perhaps she is more serious than others have been about her plans.
She has been around the ANC block often enough to know she will have a hard fight on her hands.
Sadtu, which already has threatened to shut down the schools if the minister of basic education, Angie Motshekga, does not resign, probably will not hesitate to ruin another school year if Sisulu goes ahead with her plans.
She will need the steel that allowed Maggie Thatcher to win her showdown with the miners’ unions if she is to overcome the obstructionism of Sadtu.
Other measures she has announced will break the chain of cadre enrichment and also will be vehemently opposed by some of her party colleagues.
If she is clever, resolute and successful, Sisulu will do a service to all South Africans. If she blinks, she will leave us untangling the mess of another unfulfilled promise.
We wish her well.
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