Public Protector Roadshow focuses on Northern Cape, Free State and Gauteng stakeholders

Various stakeholders in Northern Cape, Free State and Gauteng will this week hear from Public Protector Adv. Busisiwe Mkhwebane on how they could assist her office to reduce its overflowing caseload.

The Public Protector’s visit is part of a nationwide roadshow during which she holds talks with public sector decision makers and other interested parties on the importance of addressing service delivery complaints internally before the grievances could be escalated to her office.

She is calling on the organs of state to establish in-house complaints resolution units, customer service units or sectoral ombudsman institutions, and to develop Service Standards and Service Delivery Charters.  

The roadshow has already been to Mpumalanga, Limpopo, North West and the Eastern Cape. It seeks to give effect to Pillar 7 of the Public Protector Vision 2023 – a detailed plan which is essentially about taking the institution’s services to the grassroots. Pillar 7 encourages organs of state to establish effective internal complaints resolution units, customer service units or sectoral ombudsman offices.

While it is true that the Public Protector’s mandate is broad, covering any and every administrative action within state affairs to the exclusion of court decisions, it is also correct that not every case must necessarily be brought to the attention of the Public Protector.

“This is precisely why it is critical for organs of state to establish effective complaints resolution units, customer service units or sector-specific ombudsman institutions in the mould of the Health, Tax and Military Ombudsman,” Adv. Mkhwebane said.

That way individual cases that would ordinarily clog her office’s system would be handled by such institutions, allowing her team of investigators to focus on systemic and own-initiative matters.

Her first stop will be at Sol Plaatje municipality on Tuesday where she is scheduled to have a discussion with municipal and government provincial officials, and later address students at the Northern Cape TVET College. The Public Protector will then cross into the Free State on Thursday where she is scheduled to engage with students, municipal and provincial government officials at the Maluti-a-Phofung municipality. She will wrap up the week by engaging with stakeholders in the Sedibeng District Municipality in Gauteng on Friday.

The meetings in Kimberly will take place as follows:

• Date               : Tuesday, 11 September 2018
• Time               : 13:00
• Venue            : Auditorium Academic Building C016Sol Plaatje University

• Date               : Tuesday, 11 September 2018
• Time               : 15:00
• Venue            : Northern Cape TVET College, Galeshewe

The meetings in Free State are scheduled as follows:

• Date               : Thursday, 13 September 2018
• Time               : 10:00
• Venue            : Council Chambers, Maluti-a-Phofung Municipality

• Date               : Thursday, 13 September 2018
• Time               : 14:00
• Venue            : Maluti-a-Phofung TVET, Phuthaditjhaba

The Gauteng leg of the roadshow will take places as follows:

•           Date               : Friday, 14 September 2018

•           Time               : 09:00

•           Venue            : Desmond Tutu Auditorium, Vaal University of Technology, Vanderbjilpark       

•           Date               : Friday, 14 September 2018

•           Time               : 14:00

•           Venue            : Emfuleni Municipality Council Chambers, Vanderbjilpark