KZN Premier's office ranked seventh

INLSA

Zweli Mkhize

Western Cape Premier Helen Zille will be thrilled that the Public Service Commission rated her the best performing premier in the country in 2010/11, while her counterpart in the troubled Eastern Cape, Premier Noxolo Kiviet, had to settle for last place.

KZN’s premier’s office came in seventh out of the nine premiers’ offices.

The Public Service Commission evaluates various levels of government against nine constitutional values and principles, including: professional ethics; efficiency, accountability; economy and effectiveness; impartiality and fairness and transparency.

“The best performer… was the Western Cape, which attained excellent performance against all the principles,” was the commission’s verdict on Zille’s department. This earned Zille an overall score of 82 percent against a 61 percent average across the provinces.

Gauteng Premier Nomvula Mokonyane was rated second with an overall score of 77 percent, followed by Northern Cape Premier Hazel Jenkins (64 percent).

The remaining provinces “performed adequately against several of the principles” with North West Premier Thandi Modise (59 percent) and Mpumalanga Premier David Mabuza (59 percent) leading the stragglers – Free State Premier Ace Magashule (56 percent), KZN Premier Zweli Mkhize (54 percent) and Limpopo Premier Cassel Mathale (54 percent) – with Kiviet (47 percent) bringing up the rear.

Measured against the principle of “professional ethics”, which included how quickly and efficiently premiers’ departments dealt with misconduct cases, the Western Cape and KZN tied for first place with scores of 90 percent.

On the item of “standards” which dealt with how budget was spent and the implementation of programmes, KZN came third (60 percent) after Gauteng and the Free State, earning 90 and 70 percent respectively.

Checked against the previous assessment, it was found that four offices had not implemented all the recommendations made by the Public Service Commission in the first assessment. “It is noteworthy that those offices whose performance has increased notably in the second assessment are also offices who have implemented most of the commission’s recommendations,” said Mthembu.

In the category measuring compliance with employment equity laws the Western Cape surprised by topping the list with a score of 70 percent, followed by Gauteng, Limpopo and the Northern Cape, each with scores of 60 percent.

The commission expressed concern about the fact that the average score in this category was just 49 percent, with the Eastern Cape, Free State, KZN and North West all scoring 40 percent or less.

“Only the Western Cape’s performance was good against most of the standards. The remaining eight offices’ performance varied between ‘adequate against several standards’ and ‘poor performance against most standards’,” while North West – with a paltry 20 percent – was deemed to have achieved ‘no performance against most of the standards’.”