26 Feb 2014

Parliament has been informed that under the new structure of the Ministry of Youth, Sport and Culture, Shoshong constituency will continue to be serviced from Mahalapye Sub-district office, with increased capacity and improved turnaround times.

Answering a question in Parliament on Tuesday, February 25, the Minister of Youth, Sport and Culture, Mr Shaw Kgathi said he was unable to avail the revised structure that would service the Shoshong constituency as work on the deployment structures was still on-going.

Minister Kgathi said there were several factors that necessitated the review and implementation of a new organisational structure in his ministry and key amongst these were the apparent misalignment of functions and responsibilities, which led to duplication of duties and effort.

He said the current structure was top heavy, hierarchical in nature, and with multiple levels of command and this led to bureaucracy, poor resource utilisation, poor supervision and incapacity to achieve professional growth and development.

The minister said, “primarily, the restructuring aims at strengthening district coordination of functions for improved service delivery” and that it was critical to establish a well-structured and coordinated reporting mechanism to facilitate delivery of the ministry’s mandate across the country.

Mr Kgathi said the ministry’s current budget would be sufficient to implement the new structure and work on the deployment structures is in progress and a draft Job Effectiveness Descriptions for new positions is with DPSM for assessment and approval.

“Consultations have already been held with staff and the affected trade unions, in accordance with the requirements of the Public Service Act,” he said.

The ministry does not anticipate any retrenchments resulting from the implementation of the new structure and commencement date of the structure is April 1 2014, he said.

Furthermore, Mr Kgathi said with any expected change initiative, there would be a need to build capacity in line with the new roles and responsibilities in order to close any skills gaps that might be identified.

He said some of the key benefits of the new structure for the rural areas would include improved coordination of roles and functions resulting in improved service delivery.

“District coordinators will be appointed to oversee all ministry functions within a given district and sub district resulting in improved resource utilisation and enhanced supervision,” he said.

He said this would result in improved customer service and timeliness decisions, since decisions would be made by those closer to communities and therefore more knowledgeable about the challenges they face on a day to a day basis.

Member of Parliamentfor Shoshong, Mr Phillip Makgalemele had asked the minister what necessitated the review and implementation of a new structure in the Ministry of Youth, Sport and Culture.

MP Makgalemele also wanted the minister to state the cost implementations, time table for the implementation and whether some retrenchments were anticipated.

He further asked whether the current personnel are well capacitated with the requisite skills to service the new structure, and the minister was also to state anticipated benefits for the rural areas and to provide as an annexure the revised structure that would service the Shoshong constituency.  ENDS