The “precise powers” held by department of communications director-general Rosey Sekese are being “negotiated”, but she will stay on in the crucial role “at this stage”, says newly appointed communications minister Yunus Carrim.
Carrim was replying to questions from TechCentral about Sekese’s status following the decision in January by former communications minister Dina Pule to place the DG on “special leave”, apparently because of allegations that she had misled parliament over whether she had signed a performance contract.
Parliament’s portfolio committee found that Sekese had “misled” it regarding her performance agreement for 2012/2013.
In October 2012, the DG told the committee that she had a performance agreement. During deliberations, committee members asked for evidence of the signed performance agreement. Two documents were provided and were circulated among committee members.
After studying the two contracts, committee chairman Eric Kholwane said they were found to be “two unidentical documents” that didn’t have signatures of both Sekese and Pule. Therefore, they did not constitute a performance agreement, Kholwane said at the time.
However, following Pule’s decision to place her on special leave, Sekese successfully challenged this in the labour court.
In April, the suspension was lifted and Sekese returned to work. However, Pule stripped her of some of her key decision-making powers, including the ability to hire and fire staff at the department. These powers were handed to deputy director-general Gift Buthelezi.
Two months later, Pule told parliament that she was working with public service & administration minister Lindiwe Sisulu to find “the most appropriate” way of dealing with the matter.
Now Carrim has told TechCentral that Sekese “is the director-general of the department of communications”. However, her “precise powers are being negotiated and will be finalised after we meet with the portfolio committee to deal with some outstanding issues”.
The minister says he has discussed the issue with Kholwane.
Asked whether he intends that Sekese stays on as director-general, Carrim tells TechCentral: “At this stage, yes.” — (c) 2013 NewsCentral Media