Moving forward in Zimbabwe - Brooks World Poverty Institute - The ...

More documents

Recommendations

Info

Moving forward in Zimbabwe Reducing poverty and promoting growth Monitoring and evaluation The Monitoring and Evaluation Department Unit in the Office of the President and Cabinet was set up to coordinate, direct and give some control and oversight of policy reform initiatives. Financial management and the installation of the electronic financial management system were introduced, led by the Ministry of Finance, in order to improve financial accountability and expenditure control. Several other policy initiatives and measures were introduced, including job evaluation and job profiling to match skills to tasks, and institutionalisation of the capacity to conduct cost/benefit audits, with the purpose of improving the overall performance of the public service and its contribution to national development. Status of the reforms Table 10.2 compiles some of the measures implemented, their status and outcomes, including comments on the reforms. Table 10.2: Status of public service reforms. Goal Status Outcome Comments • Performance management system • Performance agreements in place for permanent secretary’s strategic and work plans. Permanent secretaries’ staff trained in the system. • Most civil servants know their ministry vision and mission and have individual action plans. • No tangible results on impact of these systems in service delivery. Nor that permanent secretaries have been individually assessed for organisational performance. • Public service behaviour: rules and regulations applied for misconduct • Customer survey conducted at immigration border posts. • Client charter in all ministries. • Anti-Corruption Commission established in 2004 and several cases of misappropriation of state funds dealt with by Public Service Commission. • Inspectorate and Audit Agency investigations. • Public satisfied with the sign-posting. Benches to sit exist but are few. Staff are courteous. • Not all ministry staff aware of client charter existence and purpose. • Anti-Corruption Commission received 1,513 corruption cases: 60 cases completed in courts, 180 administratively completed and 310 awaiting prosecution. • Officials in the Welfare Department discharged for misappropriating BEAM funds. • Grain Marketing Board and councillors arraigned for converting agricultural inputs to own use through forgery of documents, after public service inspector uncovered the illegal action. • Underhand activities perceived to exist at border posts. Not all officials are familiar with client charter contents. • Need to conduct regular customer satisfaction survey in order to assess conduct of public officials. • Corruption data not yet disaggregated to reveal public and private officials’ involvement. • Need to further capacitate this agency, in order to route out corruption in the public service. • Human resources management • Population of all organisational structures captured for ministries by the Public Service Commission. • All personnel details captured for all PSC secretariat staff. • Delay in personnel data captured from ministries to complete programme. • Need to install compatible computer hardware in ministries and set targets to complete exercise. • Skills: best talent recruited and matched to functions. Continuous training. • Job evaluation and profiling conducted for all public service positions. • Assessment and examination centre in place. • Staff development at internal and external training institutions. • Better match between function and competence. • Assessments and examinations conducted for promotion to middle and senior management grades. • Human resources development plans submitted yearly by ministries to the Public Service Commission. • No assessment to reflect improvement in service delivery. • Need to cascade assessment to ministries for lower level positions subject to funding. • No impact assessment done to reflect on training investment improvement to individual and organisational performance. • Incentives and merit: public servants are appraisal rewarded and sanctioned, based on merit and performance. • Compensation policy in place. • Transport and accommodation allowance provided for all grades incrementally according to grades. • Public pay has increased considerably but still remains low, due to hyperinflation. Performance appraisals still tend to be subjective. • Public service buses now in major urban areas for public servants at subsidised fares. • Incentives put in place to retain operational staff. Public service remains a training ground. Loss of operational staff continues to weaken service delivery. • Moonlighting is rampant in order to supplement meagre salaries across the grades. 116
Moving forward in Zimbabwe Reducing poverty and promoting growth Table 10.2 continued Goal Status Outcome Comments • Public finance management information system. • Results-based value added and accountability promoted. • Treasury instruction systematically applied. • Timely production of annual accounts. • Incumbents trained in software. • Finance departments computerised. • More accountability though projects and programmes not completed, due to erosion of dollar value caused by hyperinflation. • System refined to cope with the many zeros of currency. • No evidence except to suggest that permanent secretaries use system on regular basis to monitor expenditure as the accounting officers. • Need to integrate programme to HRMIS. • Gender and HIV/AIDS mainstreaming. • Increase awareness and provide counselling to those affected by HIV/AIDS, and prevention measures in public servants in order to retain their services. • Remove barriers impeding gender equality at work places and women’s promotion to senior decisionmaking positions. • Gender and HIV/AIDS focal point in place all ministries. • Incumbents trained. • No assessment of impact of programme on prevention and care of public servants, though awareness increased. • Attrition data from ministries do not necessarily reveal HIV and AIDS situation, because of privacy policy. • Few cases of discrimination based on gender reported • Slow implementation of gender equality to senior management levels. • Monitoring and evaluation unit provides leadership and coordinates reform activities, in order to ensure consistency and complementarity. • Unit established; needs to fully be capacitated. • Needs to be e-enabled. • Need to be put in place the integrated results-based management. Includes results-based budgeting, results-based personnel performance system, and results-based monitoring and evaluation. • Need to conduct regular impact assessments to capture impact and best practice, and provide coherence and synergy of the various reform initiatives. 10.4 Conclusion and recommendations This chapter has shown how the public service is a key player in the production and delivery of public goods. The public service also acts as a catalyst for promoting citizens’ involvement in the public domain, thus enhancing accountability and openness in the management of government business. This chapter has also shown, however, that in the absence of a strong command centre to allocate resources and to coordinate and provide political direction to reforms, the intended outcomes and benefits of the reforms may not be met. This section puts forward some recommendations for reinvigorating the public service in the post-crisis period. The fundamental role of the Public Service Commission is to match skilled personnel with appropriate posts and compensation packages, to ensure effective and efficient implementation of government policies. This would ensure that there is a stable service delivery to the satisfaction of citizens. Unpredictable wage and salary levels for public servants in a hyperinflationary environment impact negatively on skills retention and job performance, and on the overall performance of government. Sustained efforts also need to be made to attract external assistance to support public reforms. Policy initiatives and public service reform measures are in place, but need to be strengthened and also refocused to provide policy coherence to other reforms. Policy coherence is necessary for national development priorities – especially poverty reduction and empowerment – to be realised, in conjunction with additional financial, material and technical resources, including the government’s own resources and those from development partners, as appropriate. Below are suggestions for strengthening the capacity of the public service effectively to implement the reform programme sustainably, achieve the desired results and contribute to reducing the crisis: 1. The Office of the President Reform Unit should be strengthened in strategic thinking, in order to enhance its capacity to provide high value policy analysis and coherence across government. By virtue of its strategic location, prevailing over all ministries, it can take a long-term view, is able to commission studies of a cross-cutting nature and can conduct strategic audits on where the government stands in respect to reform. 2. An implementation committee should be established. This should comprise all permanent secretaries, have a clear mandate, be linked to the Office of the President and Cabinet and the Public Service Commission, and be staffed by a high calibre person as secretary. This is critical if the challenges to implementation are to be addressed swiftly and to reinforce the champion role of the permanent secretary in the reform process. 3. Strengthen and capacitate all the permanent secretaries to take a leading role in the reforms through targeted staff development programmes, especially in corporate planning, strategic management and the promotion of a culture of excellence. 4. Strengthen the HIV/AIDS mainstreaming mechanism, in order to provide sufficient counselling support to those affected, and to raise awareness. 117
Page 1 and 2:
The University of Manchester Brooks
Page 3 and 4:
Moving forward in Zimbabwe Reducing
Page 5 and 6:
Page 7 and 8:
Page 9 and 10:
Page 11 and 12:
Page 13 and 14:
Page 15 and 16:
Page 17 and 18:
Page 19 and 20:
Page 21 and 22:
Page 23 and 24:
Page 25 and 26:
Page 27 and 28:
Page 29 and 30:
Page 31 and 32:
Page 33 and 34:
Page 35 and 36:
Page 37 and 38:
Page 39 and 40:
Page 41 and 42:
Page 43 and 44:
Page 45 and 46:
Page 47 and 48:
Page 49 and 50:
Page 51 and 52:
Page 53 and 54:
Page 55 and 56:
Page 57 and 58:
Page 59 and 60:
Page 61 and 62:
Page 63 and 64:
Page 65 and 66:
Page 67 and 68:
Page 69 and 70:
Page 71 and 72:
Page 73 and 74: Moving forward in Zimbabwe Reducing
Page 123: Moving forward in Zimbabwe Reducing
show all

Moving forward in Zimbabwe - Brooks World Poverty Institute - The ...

Create successful ePaper yourself

Delete template?

Save as template?