Not one of South Africa's 38 departments has implemented an ICT governance framework because the Department of Public Service and Administration (DPSA) is still developing guidelines.
According to the Adjusted Estimates of National Expenditure, the department only expects to wrap up implementation guidelines in the new financial year, which starts next April.
Earlier this year, government indicated that an ICT management framework and draft implementation guidelines for the public service would be finalised by March 2013. National Treasury's Estimates of National Expenditure, released in February, contained the timeframe.
The estimates document also said DPSA will improve government's IT security by "developing the minimum information security standards framework by March 2013". In addition, the department will be "conducting research" on an identity management framework, to be complete by the same time.
IT governance and security is vital to protect information and eliminate corruption. However, the auditor-general's report for the year to March 2011 found that, of the 38 national departments audited, 81% did not have full security management systems in place, and 79% did not have a complete IT governance framework.
The root cause of the lack of IT governance and IT security is the DPSA's delay in rolling out frameworks, the AG found.
DPSA spent 93.5% of last year's budget and, so far, has spent 41.6% of the R726.9 million it was allocated for this year. It reported under-spending of R2.5 million due to delays in service provision from the State IT Agency (SITA), and that money was transferred to the department's intern project.
The department also recorded savings of R2 million due to lower than budgeted municipal costs for the Urban Thusong Service Centres and security services contract costs, as well as under-spending resulting from delays in the provision of information and communication technology specialised services by SITA.
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