(NACF). These complement the government’s National Anti-Corruption Hotline (NACH),
managed by the Public Service Commission (PSC) on behalf of the state.
The Report also discusses access to information and the role of mass media in enhancing
popular participation in democratic governance, especially, in providing knowledge and
information, in order to hold public leadership accountable. The implementation of
government programmes creates a compulsory requirement for government departments
not only to consult the citizens but also to provide feedback on the achievement of the
articulated objectives. All government departments are obliged in terms of the White Paper
on Batho Pele to submit Citizen Feedback Reports to the Office of the Public Service
Commission (PSC) on annual basis. Even though such are developed for compliance
purposes, access to information on government programmes remains an integral
requirement for governance.
On the growing institutionalisation of democracy, the Report covers issues of public
consultation, education and feedback in policy making. Citizens, as financiers of government
through the statutory duty to pay taxes, are “co-owners” of the government policies and
spaces should be expanded for their participation, education and feedback to enhance their
voice in the decisions of the State (Yang and Callahan, 2005; Kondlo 2011:923; Omolo
2010:48).
b) Economic Governance and Management
With regard to economic governance and management, the Report acknowledges that the
country continues to be confronted by an acute lack of capacity, especially, financial
expertise to manage social programmes, public spending and facilitation of the delivery of
services at the provincial, district and local levels. Even though the 2011/2012 Audit
outcomes reflect that the country is making progress as the number of entities and
departments reporting clean audits as a key indicator of sound public finance management
increase year-on-year, this is occurring at a slow pace. The Report underlines the strategic
interventions by National Treasury (NT), the Auditor-General (AG) and the Public
Administration Leadership and Management Academy (PALAMA) in building sound financial
management capacity in the public sector and in improving audit outcomes in the three
spheres of government. It explains the initiatives to institutionalise the capacity to manage
public expenditure and improve audit outcomes. The PALAMA also co-hosted the
Conference of the Commonwealth Association of Public Administration and Management
(CAPAM), focused on examining the role of leadership and management practices at all
levels of government, fostering a culture of responsive leadership and management
accountability, and training and development for state delivery capacity enhancement. The
exchange of lessons and experiences and the outcomes of the conference are being fed into
the public service system in order to contribute to responsive leadership and accountability.
Extensively, progress has been made with regard to increasing the number of people in
employment despite a continued high level of unemployment. The total number of people
employed in the economy reached 13.1 million by the 4th Quarter of 2010. The
unemployment statistics as contained in the Quarterly Labour Force Surveys conducted by
Statistics South Africa (Stats SA) show that in the 4th Quarter of 2010 (October-December)
the rate of unemployment had declined slightly and was measured at 24.0%. In 2011, the
unemployment rate remained relatively stable with marginal changes downwards. In the 1st
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