Will Ramaphosa’s new brooms revive South Africa’s flagging OGP programme?

Tracy-Lynn Humby, OGP IRM Researcher

The President has shown his hand. And in the late-night-reshuffle tradition reminiscent of his predecessor, he has dismissed the ill-reputed Faith Muthambi as Minister of Public Service and Administration and replaced her with Ayanda Dlodlo, who previously served this portfolio as a Deputy. Lindiwe Sisulu has in turn been instituted as the new Minister of International Relations and Cooperation. Will sense now prevail between these two Ministers to revive South Africa’s flagging commitment to the Open Government Partnership (OGP)?    

The OGP is a voluntary, multilateral initiative that secures government commitments to promote transparency, civic participation and public accountability, and to harness new technologies towards these ends. South Africa was one of eight founding members of the OGP when it was launched in 2011 – membership has since grown to 70 participating countries and 15 subnational governments. Under Dlodlo’s leadership, South Africa’s first OGP Special Envoy, South Africa was the first African nation to sit on the OGP Steering Committee (an oversight body comprising representatives of government and CSOs) and between 2015 – 2016 we co-chaired this institution. Notwithstanding the already-entrenched demise and despair of the Zuma decade back home, on assumption of the co-chair we were punted as a polity intent on using the OGP to deepen good governance practices in South Africa, and more broadly on the African continent, for the common good.   

Participating OGP members must endorse a high-level Open Government Declaration, deliver a two-year national action plan in consultation with civil society, and commit to independent reporting on progress going forward. Alongside government’s self-assessment of its progress, the Independent Report Mechanism (IRM) is a key means by which national stakeholders and international peers track progress. Every year an appointed IRM Researcher produces a progress report examining the development and implementation of OGP action plans, and makes technical recommendations for improvements.

South Africa launched its third national action plan mid-2016, with eight open government commitments: To strengthen citizen-based monitoring of certain government services (police stations, health care facilities, and social security service points); increase civic society participation in open budgeting processes; establish and enhance “back to basics” governance mechanisms at local level; expand the development of an environmental management information portal; support the development of community-advice offices (the first privately-led OGP commitment); pilot an open data portal for government-held information; roll out an open government awareness raising campaign; and take action on a plan to entrench the transparency of beneficial ownership.

The IRM Progress Report on the third national action plan was published for public comment mid-February, 2018. While the IRM Report notes an improvement in the specificity and scope of the action plan commitments, and progress in their delivery, it also details worrying levels of dysfunction. In fact, the OGP in South Africa is probably at its lowest ebb ever.

The reasons for this state of affairs are varied. The establishment of a mooted permanent OGP National Steering Committee of government and civil society representatives has been dragging on for years and is still not finalized; none of the commitments expressly addressed the issues of state capture that were of great concern to CSOs at the time of the action plan’s formulation; a number of commitments were already completed prior to the action plan’s formal commencement, signaling a lack of ambition; the government has missed the deadline for publication of its self-assessment report; and government relations with CSOs traditionally supportive of the OGP have declined significantly, even as attempts were made to expand interest and participation in the program to a broader spectrum of grassroots organizations.

In March 2017, with Dlodlo’s reassignment to the Ministry of Communications, the question also arose whether the Department of Public Service and Administration (DPSA) should remain the OGP lead agency, or whether the programme should follow the former Special Envoy to her new portfolio. On 12 July 2017 former President Zuma finally indicated that the OGP had been transferred to the Department of International Relations and Cooperation (DIRCO), which after the latest reshuffle leaves Sisulu in charge.

The decision to transfer the OGP from the DPSA to DIRCO has not been well-received by civil society. There is upset that no attempt was made to communicate and consult with civil society stakeholders and concern that the DIRCO does not have a good track record of stakeholder engagement. Some civil society stakeholders believe that the decision is wrong on conceptual and practical grounds, as OGP practice has been to situate the programme’s implementation with government entities having a mandate of public sector reform and innovation (DPSA) or entities with major convening and/or monitoring authority over other spheres of the public sector (such as the Office of the Presidency or the Department of Performance Monitoring and Evaluation).

Until a few days ago, the DIRCO had not yet formally taken ownership of the programme. With Dlodlo now at the helm of the DPSA she may well seek to bring the OGP back into her fold and reinvigorate its processes and potential. The appropriate institutional home of the OGP should be put to consultation, however, in the first of a series of steps towards renewal, including setting up the OGP National Steering Committee.

A number of the undertakings in Ramaphosa’s soaring maiden State of the Nation Address could benefit from a rigorous OGP programme, not least of which improving budgeting, procurement and monitoring programs, restoring the integrity of the South African Revenue Services, and rooting out corruption and inefficiency in a number of public agencies and state-owned enterprises. With the new-broomism that is at least partially characterizing the Ramaphosa administration, it is an opportune time to reflect and take action.