7 June 2006

By Shaun Benton

President Thabo Mbeki has emphasised the developmental nature of the South African state, saying government must move away from the "silo-approach" in which it tends to work.

He said that there must be greater collaboration across government as a whole.

With the country continuing to eradicate poverty and social deprivation that marks a developing country, he said that "at the heart of effecting change is the need for a strategic management capacity in the public service that shifts the silo-approach in which government tends to work."

There must be also be greater cooperation across the three spheres of government, the president said in the National Assembly as he delivered the budget vote of the presidency at the end of the ministerial budget vote season.

While the Cabinet cluster system already brings a more collaborative approach to governance at ministerial level, this cluster approach must now "focus on improving the capacity of departments to collaborate on common projects".

The President also criticised "continuing under-spending" by some government departments, which he said was "unacceptable" in the context of South Africa's status as a developmental state that was using all the machinery at its disposal to bring economic growth and enhance economic opportunities for the poor.

In the context of the pressing developmental needs of the country and with the "excellent work" of the South African Revenue Service (SARS) at collecting revenue and improving tax morality, under-spending by some government departments was all the more unacceptable, the President indicated.

"We must again draw the attention of all our spheres of government to address the continuing under-spending of allocated budgets, which, among other things, impacts negatively on our ability to use a higher but perfectly manageable budget deficit to make available more resources to accelerate investment especially in social and economic infrastructure, and provide for higher economic spending by the public sector," President Mbeki said.

He added: "Consistent with the obligations of a developmental state, we must and will continue to attend to all the factors that result in the unacceptable under-spending to which we have referred."

He went on to urge greater interaction and collaboration within a single public service, humbled by the bigger picture of service delivery to the poor, that will result in the more efficient and effective delivery of basic services to the poor that will give them a basis to use the enhanced economic opportunities becoming available as the economy grows.

"Another important feature of our developmental state must be the provision of a seamless system of government, even as we continue to respect that it is constituted in three spheres," he said.

A key level for implementation of a more seamless level of government is at the axis where municipalities meet provinces, the President indicated, saying that the recently-promulgated Intergovernmental Relations Framework Act would "give effect to the principle of cooperative governance between the provinces and the municipalities".

He cited a recently-released report – the fifth since 2002 - of the Public Service Commission that found that "a lot more effort is required to improve the planning and formulation of development projects targeted at reducing poverty".

This showed the importance of continuously improving the performance of the public service "as a vital element of constructing the effective developmental state that we need".

At the same time, he said, as a developmental state, government is determined to use state-owned enterprises (SOEs) as engines of economic growth in South Africa.

This comes in the context of other economic models that might, for example, argue for the privatisation of such enterprises, although such an approach is increasingly outdated, even among international financial institutions.

A developmental view is that as potential economic engines, SOEs can boost infrastructure and help to expand the economy, creating not only further fiscal space to alleviate the plight of the poor but also to lay the basis for the increased opportunities that can pull people out of poverty.

"Within the context of the effort to improve the performance of the developmental state, I must also underline our determination to ensure that all state-owned corporations and development institutions make their contribution to the realisation of the goals we have set ourselves in Asgisa (the Accelerated and Shared Growth Initiative of South Africa), as well as our economic growth and development in general."

The President also spoke about the necessary humility of the civil servant, quoting a developmental theorist as saying: "Humility towards the poor is the greatest attribute of a civil servant."

 

Source: BuaNews