SITA denies DTI probe

By Paul Vecchiatto for SITA

Cape Town, 09 Nov 2006

The State IT Agency (SITA) asked the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) to help it recover money owed by other state-owned enterprises and departments, and was not itself being investigated, SITA CEO Mavuso Msimang said yesterday.

Msimang was answering questions before the Parliamentary Select Committee on Public Service and Administration on his agency's annual report.

"Through our minister [public service and administration minister Geraldine Fraser-Moleketi], we requested the minister of trade and industry [Mandisi Bongani] to help us find and recover money owed us for products and services rendered," he said.

Msimang went on to say that while the Public Finance Management Act stated that state-owned enterprises and other government organs were required to pay invoices within 45 days, they seldom actually did. He also said the long time period for some of the outstanding payments meant the debts would probably be written off.

Disputes about services

"Some of our invoices, about R12 million, have been outstanding for four years or more, and in some cases there have been disputes about the services rendered and there has been a lack of documentation and the people involved have left. However, in many cases we have had legal advice that debts owed us are recoverable and that is why we asked for help," he said.

Msimang also outlined steps that were being taken to solve some of the matters of emphasis placed by the auditor-general in SITA's annual report and he also took issue with others. However, he pointed out that SITA had received an unqualified audit for the second consecutive year.

"The issue about property, namely two buildings in Tshwane, is out of our control and the departments responsible have not done what they are supposed to do," he says.

Internal controls

Msimang said a cross-department internal committee was addressing the matter of internal controls and was on track to ensure these were improved.

He felt it was unfair the auditor-general had decided to keep the comments about irregular, fruitless and wasteful expenditure, "...because nothing materially occurred during the year under review and that happened in the previous year".

SITA's transformation was a big issue, Msimang said, and this had affected morale within the organisation as it slowly changed its racial make-up to become more reflective of the overall population.

Msimang pointed to SITA's three strategic projects: its integrated financial management system that has achieved some milestones; that SITA was about to issue a tender for its municipal blueprint project; and its partnership model that will invite industry to share risk and rewards in large capital projects.