Public sector reports flow thick and fast as September 30 deadline nears

Public sector annual reports continued to flow into parliament in copious amounts last week in a last-minute rush to meet the September 30 deadline, after which the errant departments or entities would be in major trouble with their ministers.

In terms of the now universally dreaded Public Finance Management Act, public departments, parastatals and other bodies receiving taxpayers' funds have to submit their audited annual reports by the end of September.

If not, the minister responsible will have to answer to parliament for the failure to meet the deadline, something no minister really wants to go through.

The only problem about the piles of annual reports now rapidly taking up all available pigeon-hole and other space in parliament is that few MPs of either house are around to collect them, let alone read and digest their contents before they return in mid-October.

But if they did have the time, they would find an interesting collection of documents detailing what government is all about, and what progress has been made in the first 10 years of democracy - a common theme running through many of the reports.

On one hand, there is no doubt that a lot has been done, but, as the Human Rights Commission reports released as far back as June highlighted, much still needs to be done by government to fully live up to the mandate of service delivery given to it by the electorate.

But delivery goes beyond just providing houses, electricity, water and health services to more people, important as these are.

As trade and industry minister Mandisi Mpahlwa said in his introduction to the Competition Commission's annual report for 2003/04, one of the other areas where more work was needed was dealing with the "abuse of dominance to level the playing fields for smaller firms...(and) ensure competitive prices and choice for South Africans".

Price fixing and the abuse of dominance not only had a negative impact on the economy, but eradicated efficiencies and cost the consumer dearly, he said.

But one area where progress has definitely been made was the number of departments turning in unqualified audit reports.

That Shauket Fakie, the auditor-general, still highlighted "matters of emphasis" despite unqualified audits, only showed that he was more exacting.

But it gets more complex when one considers the annual report of, say, the National Lotteries Board. It received a clean bill of health from Fakie.

This audit report pleased chairman Joe Foster no end, probably because of all the idle speculation by the many people who have yet to win anything substantial through the lottery about what happens to the millions it rakes in every week.

The unqualified audit, he said, revealed "the highest level of integrity, responsibility and control on the part of the board and its employees".

But does the fact that it created 89 millionaires in 2003/04 and has allocated more than R2.2 billion to more than 5 000 bodies since 2000 line up with our real developmental needs?

Maybe it does, maybe it doesn't, depending on your ideological, religious or other persuasion.