07 Nov 2013

Public service ambassadors have called on public servants to regard the public service charter as a ‘constitution’ that guides a customer-centric service delivery.

Speaking during their tour of Tsabong where they paid courtesy call on the district leadership, public service custodians and Tsabong Junior Secondary School students, the winners of the public service pageant preached great customer experience to the service providers.

In their deliberations, they reminded the public servants about the eight principles of the public service charter which they said formed the core of their mandate as the ambassadors of public service. They also addressed the 10 points that the cabinet had picked from the customer satisfaction survey.

Amongst these 10 burning issues were adherence to time schedule including absenteeism, inconvenience and delays in service and apparently increasing corruption in government offices. They also informed the public servants about the projects they sought to undertake in order to promote the culture of good work ethic and high customer service.

Mr Public Service 2013 who is also a principal public relations officer at the Office of the Ombudsman Mr Fenny Letshwiti said that his reign was dedicated to inter alia dispel the misconceptions that public service was about job security and characterised by poor customer service.

Mr Letshwiti was optimistic that the public service could be vibrant and attract skilled staff just like any other employ. To achieve this, he advocated for modernisation of the public service by way of e-governance amongst other things. He revealed that he chose to compete in the pageant after a thorough consideration of the expectations put on the eventual winner such as promoting good work ethic comparable to the best practices the world over.

“I felt obliged to play a role in the development of my country since I realised that I had virtually all the qualities expected of me,” said the reigning Mr Public Service 2013.

Part of his efforts to effect change before handing over the crown to the next king would be to work with young people and inculcate and instill the spirit of strong work ethic so that they could shine by the time they join the public service employ.

His counterpart Miss Public Service who is a teacher at Bakgatla Junior School, Ms Kgomotso Kaisara said the public service had already shown some signs of positive transformation despite the public having realised that as yet.

Ms Kaisara said that her desire was to see public service transformed from what it used to be and as such urged all to hatch fresh, new ideas as part of the endeavor. She encouraged public servants to spearhead the change they desire so long as they were within the confines of the public service charter.

As part of her project, she started visiting civil servants to help link their duties to specific principles of the public service charter so that customer will be eventually satisfied.

In the company of Mr and Miss Public Service were the first and the second princes and princesses who also outlined their projects aimed at cultivating a culture of performance as well as adherence to the public service charter. For his part, the district commissioner, Mr Moemedi Letina commended the ambassadors for their efforts to improve public service.

However, he said, “we all agree that public servants should perform to the expected level but should be availed resources to discharge such duties.” He was referring to the shortage of resources experienced by public servants in his commissioning area which he described as challenging. He pointed out that some offices still lacked network connectivity let alone hardwares to realise. ENDS