State-owned companies corporate governance challenges: progress report; Department of Public Enterprises 1st Quarter 2015/16 performance

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Public Enterprises

09 September 2015
Chairperson: Ms D Rantho (ANC) (Acting)
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Meeting Summary

The Minister of Public Enterprises told the Committee that the concept of government ownership, and the government conducting itself as a shareholder in essential sectors, was emerging as an important vehicle by which the state could achieve its strategic economic objectives. The success of such an approach required a specific shareholder management model, combining commercial characteristics with the state’s strategic intent. Enterprise ownership allowed the government to leverage the institution that drove the developmental agenda of the economy, to ensure the realisation of these aspirations.

State-Owned Companies (SOCs) had a responsibility to create a developmental path through measures such as localisation, the development of Small, Micro to Medium Enterprises (SMMEs), and training and skills development. However current legislation did not enable effective management of this delicate balance -- the Constitution required the establishment of Treasury controls, to ensure transparency and spending control in each sphere. The shareholder functions of the state had not been legislated through the Public Finance Management Act (PFMA) as financial management legislation. A concept paper had been developed, to look at the governance model for SOCs. The shareholder compact remained an important tool for users, as it provided clear direction for SOCs to meet their legislative mandates, and subsequently to support government objectives.

Members asked why government was not entertaining the possibility of having certain aspects of Eskom privatised? What was the role of SOCs in realizing the National Development Plan (NDP)? When would the Minister ensure that the Board of Eskom appointed executives on a full time basis? What kind of contract had the DPE entered into with all the SOCs?

The Department of Public Enterprises (DPE) said most SOCs were exposed to external pressures which forced companies to begin assessing their financial sustainability. In responding to the external environment, a new strategy had been developed and was currently being implemented by the DPE. The journey incorporated an internal turnaround of the DPE as well as its SOCs, and ensured that capacity was created within these SOCs to deliver on the demands of the economy. Investments by the SOCs had continued to increase as part of government’s counter-cyclical policy, and had been focused to support development of new industrial capacities, and reprioritized to support areas with high growth potential, such as the oceans economy.

The performance of SOCs was measured against the shareholder compact. Transnet had 306 Key Performance Indicators (KPIs), and 128 were achieved; Eskom had 37 KPIs, and 19 were achieved (52%), Denel had 21 KPIs, and 18 were achieved (86%), Safcol had 46 KPIs, and 36 were achieved (83%), Alexkor had achieved 100% of its targets, SA Express had 45 KPIs, and 28 were achieved (32%). Eskom, Denel, Transnet, Alexkor and the South African Forestry Company (Safcol) had all received unqualified financial reports from the Auditor General, while SA Express had received a qualified report for the last two years.

Members asked about the gender balance between the SOCs, especially at top management level. Was the DPE facilitating meetings between SA Express and other SOCs so that best practices could be exchanged? Why had bonuses been paid out to Eskom executives when the company had been seriously under-performing? Why was the DPE not arranging press conferences to talk about how well companies such as Denel and Alexkor were doing? When was the position of Director General going to be filled permanently? How was the DPE responding to SOCs which were not following, or properly implementing, legislation? Did the DPE have competent people to deal with recommendations from the Auditor General? How had the recent strike at Medupi impacted the running of the project? 

Meeting report

Nomination of Acting Chairperson

Ms Disang Mocumi, Secretary, Portfolio Committee on Public Enterprises, indicated that the Chairperson, Ms D Letsatsi-Duba (ANC) was unable to attend the meeting due to an illness. According to the rules of Parliament, the Committee needed to elect an acting Chairperson.

Ms G Nobanda (ANC) nominated Ms D Rantho (ANC) to be the acting Chairperson.

Mr R Tseli (ANC) seconded the nomination.

There were no other nominations and no objections.

Ms Rantho was nominated as the acting Chairperson for the meeting.

Minister’s overview

Ms Lynne Brown, Minister, Department of Public Enterprises (DPE) said it was unfortunate that the Committee met at the same time as Cabinet, as this made it very difficult for her to participate. She would not be staying for the rest of the meeting as a result. She said that the meeting would focus on government shareholder management and the shareholder compact. The concept of government ownership, and government conducting itself as a shareholder in essential sectorsm was emerging as an important vehicle by which the state could achieve its strategic economic objectives. The success of such an approach required a specific shareholder management model to combine commercial characteristics with the state’s strategic intent. Enterprise ownership allowed the government to leverage the institution that drove the developmental agenda of the economy to ensure the realisation of these aspirations. This was further leveraged to influence the development path of the economy, in particular, the growth of the productive sectors.

State shareholding, however, was facing a number of challenges. The state had a public mandate and a strategic long term objective which should not be displaced by short term goals based on high profitability. Through ownership of commercial enterprises, the state was injecting non-market and public objectives into the private sector capitalist market system, and this created a delicate balance. Similarly, if commercial considerations overrode strategic purpose, government objectives would be compromised. In a worst case scenario, the presence of a strategic purpose should not be used by management to rationalise bad decisions. State-Owned Companies (SOCs) had a responsibility to create a developmental path through localisation, development of Small, Micro to Medium Enterprises (SMMEs) and training and skills development, among others. However current legislation did not enable effective management of this delicate balance. The Constitution required the establishment of Treasury controls, to ensure transparency and spending control in each sphere. The shareholder functions of the state had not been legislated through the Public Finance Management Act (PFMA) as financial management legislation.

There were 700 SOCs, of which about 25 were commercially driven. Six of these were within the DPE portfolio, and the rest were elsewhere. In essence, the issue was that many had raised the point that there should not be a DPE. That discussion was being driven by the DPE with other stakeholders, such as the Department of Transport. The discussion between executives currently was whether there should be a single ownership, a dual ownership or for government to decentralise SOCs completely. The DPE had been established as a department for privatisation, and since then the government had made a new decision to not privatise companies. SOCs would rather be used to leverage the economy. She said there were currently a lot of debates around privatizing SOCs, but she held a firm view that basic services like Eskom should not be privatized.

A concept paper had been developed, to look at the governance model for SOCs. If the debate was that there should not be a public service department to run the SOCs, then that was what government should be doing. Soon such a discussion would be taken to the public domain. However, for the shareholder management to work, there needed to be a private sector participation interface. This was the second concept paper which would come up. This relationship needed to be strengthened to foster greater economic growth. The draft concept paper would be finalised by December 2015, and the proper consultation process would be initiated. With regard to the shareholder compact, she said this remained an important tool for users, as it provided clear direction for SOCs to meet their legislative mandates, and subsequently to support government objectives. The implementation of the shareholder compact was assessed on a quarterly basis. In the case of SOCs facing serious sustainability challenges, the frequency of reporting was normally adjusted. The Committee had asked for a copy of the shareholder compact. In response to that, she asked that Members rather look at the predetermined objectives in the Annual Report and advise what other objectives the Committee wanted to see. There was a real issue of confidentiality around some of the issues within SOCs.

The Chairperson thanked the Minister for the briefing.

Ms N Mazzone (DA) said the Committee needed to ensure that on a day when the Minister was available, the meetings should not be on the day when Cabinet was also sitting. The Committee liked having the Minister around and it was not fair to the Minister. She was interested in what the Minister was saying about the original concept on why the DPE had been established. The DPE had been developed as a privatisation mechanism, but the situation had changed. When companies were in an economic downturn, which the country had seen lately with South African Airways (SAA) and Eskom, at some point the government needed to make dramatic shifts regarding the economic development of these SOCs. Government did not need to privatise completely, but partial privatisation should be considered. Why was government not entertaining the possibility of having certain aspects of Eskom privatized? Eskom could be split according to the Denel model. She said there seemed to be a veil of secrecy about everything. As for the DPE not existing, this would probably be something in the far future. However, there were talks that Eskom would be moved to the Department of Energy, and that Transnet and SAA would be moved to the Department of Transport. What was going on here?

Dr Z Luyenge (ANC) thanked the Minister for the overview. He congratulated the leadership of Eskom and the DPE for the 30 days without load shedding. With regard to privatization, he said privatisation did not benefit poor people. He appreciated the work the DPE had been doing around improving the performance of SOCs. What was the role of SOCs in realising the National Development Plan (NDP)? When would the Minister ensure that the Board of Eskom appointed executives on a full time basis?

Mr Tseli also commended Eskom for the 30 days without load shedding, and for the appointment of Mr Brian Molefe. What kind of contract had the DPE entered into with all the SOCs?

Mr E Marais (DA) asked whether the Minister could accelerate the different programmes within the DPE portfolio.

The Chairperson also raised a concern around when permanent executives would be appointed to the Eskom Board. Was there no timeframe for the executive to be in an acting position? She said SOCs were very important to the economic development of the country and more focus should be paid to those which were performing well.

Minister Brown responded that pre-1994 the DPE was a department for privatization. The government had then changed, and the ruling party at the moment did not support privatisation. She was not opposed to strategic partnerships. She said government should not privatizse SOCs which provided basic services, such as Eskom. Even if the DPE were to think of privatisng Eskom, the company was divided into transmission, distribution and generation, and all three were interdependent. At this stage, Eskom was too vulnerable to even contemplate privatisation. However, there also needed to be an understanding of the energy mix and the end state of electricity for the country. This was a discussion the DPE was having with the Department of Energy.

In understanding this, the Independent System and Market Operator (ISMO) Bill could be re-introduced in some respects. The discussion had to do with determining the strategic role of SOCs. She said that the role of the SOCs was to grow the economy on the one hand, and to fulfill their developmental agendas on the other. The Eskom Board would bring decisions to her on the appointment of permanent executive staff and by the end of October 2015 this decision would be brought before Cabinet. By 1 November 2015 a decision would be made.

The Chairperson said the Committee would look at changing the days for the meeting to a day when the Minister would be in full attendance. She thanked the Minister.

Presentation: Department of Public Enterprises (DPE)

Ms Matsietsi Mokholo, Acting Director-General, DPE, briefed the Committee on the following key issues:

  • The strategic context within which the SOC operated and responses that had been put in place to respond adequately;
  • An overview of the profitability of the portfolio;
  • The performance of the portfolio on governance indicators for the 2014/15 financial year;
  • The Logical Planning and Monitoring Framework which guided the execution of the oversight mandate;
  • The shareholder compact structure and performance by SOCs.

She said that most SOCs were exposed to external pressures which forced companies to begin assessing their financial sustainability. In responding to the external environment, a new strategy had been developed and was currently being implemented by the DPE. The journey incorporated an internal turnaround of the DPE as well as its SOCs, and ensured that capacity was created within these SOCs to deliver on the demands of the economy. Investments by the SOCs had continued to increase as part of government’s counter-cyclical policy, and through these investments the SOCs had focused their support on the development of new industrial capacities. SOC investments had been reprioritised to support areas with high growth potential,such as the oceans economy.

Mr Gcina Hlabisa, Director: Strategy, DPE, spoke to the profitability of the portfolio and said audit outcomes and governance performance trends over the past two years had been concerning. Eskom, Denel, Transnet, Alexkor and the South African Forestry Company (Safcol) had all received unqualified financial reports from the Auditor General, while SA Express had been receiving a qualified report for the last two years. The SOCs, however, did not require the same level of oversight from the DPE.

With regard to the shareholder compact process and the performance assessment, a comprehensive framework had been developed, to facilitate the process. A Logical Planning and Monitoring Framework had been developed, to provide an integrated framework to enhance the alignment of the SOCs to the developmental imperatives of the state. The application of the framework was constantly reviewed to respond to the challenges identified. The shareholder compact was comprised of four major components:

  • Governance and legislative requirements;
  • Transformation and development;
  • Operational efficiency;
  • Financial sustainability

 

Ms Kgomotso Modise, Deputy Director General, Transport, DPE, said Transnet’s performance analysis, according the targets set in the shareholder compact, was that 40% of the targets had not been achieved. In total, Transnet had 306 key performance indicators. 128 had been achieved, 89 not achieved, and the rest missed and not measured. Ports productivity and pricing in the domestic ports continued to be a challenge, and this required inter-departmental intervention to be resolved. In the 2014/15 financial year, Transnet had under-performed in meeting its targets.

 

Ms Makgola Makololo, Deputy Director General: Energy, DPE said Eskom had achieved 51% of its targets, with 49% not achieved. The SOC had 37 key performance indicators. 19 had been achieved, 18 not achieved, and the rest missed. The company had missed a large number of both operational and financial sustainability ratios, such as maintenance and primary energy costs, and transformational indicators such as local content had also been missed. No bonuses had been paid by Eskom.

 

Ms Vuyo Tlale, Chief Director: Financial Analysis, DPE said Denel had achieved 86% of its shareholder compact targets. Denel had 21 key performance indicators. 18 had been achieved and three had been missed. Denel had continued its good performance, but there needed to be more focus on the transformation of the SOC.

 

Safcol had achieved 83% of its targets, and 17% were not achieved. Safcol had 46 key performance indicators in total -- 36 had been achieved, 7 had been missed and three were not measured. Most of the targets not achieved related to revenue growth, as operational conditions continued to be tough. The company had done well on its transformational targets.

 

Alexkor had achieved 100% of its targets. There had also been significant increase in the carats produced in the 2014/15 financial year, increasing to 74 000 from the 30 000 produced in 2012. The company had also increased the direct jobs created within the Richtersveldt community, from 88 to 550 permanent jobs. The Richtersveldt was a community of about 4 000 people. The company had also completed the township upgrade, with a total investment of R 130 million.

 

Ms Modise said SA Express had achieved 62% of its targets. The airline had 45 key performance indicators. 28 had been achieved, 17 not achieved, 15 had been missed and two were not measured. The airline had missed a large number of operational and financial targets due to aged aircraft that were constantly on the ground for maintenance, and the high cost structure. No bonuses had been paid.

 

Ms Mokholo said that the regulatory and governance framework within the DPE currently was in the process of being reviewed according to its shareholder management practice tools and frameworks. For example, a Bill on the Government Shareholder Management Model was being proposed to the Minister. The DPE held monthly management meetings with some SOCs, and the Department also attended quarterly review sessions with the SOCs. The Minister had requested boards to put measures in place to ensure irregular, fruitless and wasteful expenditure was avoided and to hold employees accountable when found guilty. Contrary to the depressed economic and investment environment, SOCs continued to fulfill their mandates. The SOC environment was complex and fluid and this required that the DPE respond to the emerging challenges.

 

The focus of the DPE in the current financial year was as follows:

 

Eskom: Ensure that the risk of load shedding is reduced, including the execution of the build programme and maintenance strategy.

Denel: Continue strengthening the order book to ensure sustainable generation of revenue.

Alexkor: Diversification of the company to other commodities, to ensure its future sustainability.

SA Express: Strengthening of the implementation of the SAX 2020 Strategy to support the turnaround of the airline.

Safcol: Diversification of the company, including vertical integration.

Transnet: Monitor the implementation of the Market Demand Strategy to ensure improvement in the performance of the strategic corridors.

 

Discussion

The Chairperson said the Committee had been expecting the DPE to brief Members on the performance of SOCs in the last quarter. There were no key performance indicators (KPIs) for the quarter indicated in the report.

Ms G Nobanda (ANC) said the explanation that historical issues were the reason for the financial under-performance at SA Express was not acceptable. It had been 20 years after democracy, and the government needed to move away from always blaming history. By now the DPE should have identified the exact problems at SA Express and come up with a roadmap for solutions to the challenges. The DPE needed to improve its communication strategy, as not much of the good work which other SOCs were doing was being put into the public space. For example, the work which Alexkor was doing around job creation was very good, and it needed to be highlighted. The DPE was not clear on targets. On Denel, she asked what was being done to improve targets.

Mr Tseli referred to the SOCs which were not performing, and said it could not be business as usual. One of the recommendations the Committee had made was that a forum for all the SOCs should be established, so that the SOCs which were doing well could share their best practice methods, especially in the area of financial management. Too much emphasis was being put on the SOCs which were not doing well. What was the gender balance between the SOCs, especially at top management level? From the Committee’s oversight visit to Koeberg, the DPE was doing very well with the safety measures put in place at the nuclear plant. Eskom should be commended for the work which it was doing at Koeberg.

Ms Mazzone said most of the time the Committee was disappointed with what was presented to it regarding SOCs. The Committee had had a meeting with SA Express, and Members had been delighted to congratulate them on its miraculous turnaround. Was the DPE facilitating meetings between SA Express and other SOCs so that best practices could be exchanged? What had happened at SA Express was what the Committee wanted to see at all SOCs, moving forward. Eskom, however, remained a massive concern. It had met only 51% of its performance targets. This was incredibly poor, and was something the Committee had to worry about. In the integrated report for 2014/15, R51 million had been allocated to fruitless and wasteful expenditure. This was completely unacceptable, and the Committee needed to take a firm stance, both as a Portfolio Committee and as a Ministry. People needed to be fired and held to account. Eskom had also experienced a drop in income from R7 billion to R3 billion, which had been blamed on the diesel and gas turbines. The Committee wanted to see these contracts, to see exactly what was being paid to whom. It was completely misleading for the DPE to say no bonuses had been paid at Eskom, as the integrated report stated that R10.8 million of long-term incentive bonuses had been paid out -- R1.4 million per executive. An incentive bonus was supposed to be paid put for an employee doing his or her job properly, and reaching 51% of the targets did not warrant any incentive bonus. The Committee could not congratulate Eskom for keeping the lights on for 30 days -- the lights should have never been going off. The Committee should be furious with a SOC which could not keep the lights on. She agreed with the previous Members, and said SOCs like Transnet and Denel which were doing well, were not in the media. The DPE should stop hiding its successes -- companies should be applauded for what they were doing right. Why was the DPE not having a press conference to talk about how well these companies were doing? Denel was doing extremely well.

The Chairperson said commending Eskom for the 30 days of no load shedding was necessary.

Dr Luyenge said the Committee wanted to understand how the boards of the SOCs interacted with the executive. When was the position of Director General going to be filled permanently? He said it could not be correct not to give Eskom a pat on the back for doing well in keeping the lights on, as it was a known fact that Eskom was experiencing challenges.

Mr K Morapela (EFF) said Eskom could not be praised for doing what it was supposed to be doing. The presentation was lacking in information on labour issues, especially around the Durban port. The DPE had been very explicit in indicating that Alexkor was doing very well in job creation, but the same information was not being providing regarding other SOCs. Regarding localisation, he said even though some SOCs had the capacity to manufacture goods locally, they simply ignored this and went abroad to procure goods and services. What measures were in place to ensure that such behavior was addressed?

Dr Luyenge said Denel was being praised for doing well. However, there was a contradictory view that Denel had been restructured. Why was the DPE changing the structure of Denel when it was doing so well?

The Chairperson said according to experts, the global economic recession currently taking place had not hit South Africa hard. How had the recession impacted the SOCs? How was the DPE responding to SOCs which were not following and properly implementing legislation? Did the DPE have competent people to deal with the recommendations of the Auditor General? How had the recent strike at Medupi impacted the running of the project? Could the DPE provide information on the performance of SOCs for the current quarter? The Committee had had a meeting with the Department of Trade and Industry (dti) a while back, and the dti had spoken about the lack of local purchasing by SOCs.

Mr Morapela said he would not be apologetic about criticising the presentation. With regard to non-compliance, he asked whether there were systems in place within the DPE to ensure that each SOC was complying with supply chain management processes.

Department’s response

Ms Mokholo responded to the question around the quality of the presentation. She said the DPE did its best to provide information to the Committee. In managing the Committee’s expectations moving forward, it would help if the DPE received a guideline around the issues the Committee would like to hear about. The DPE had been requested to provide the Committee with a briefing on progress made in addressing corporate governance challenges of SOCs and information on audit performance, so the information provided had therefore been limited to that. The DPE did not want to be seen as not wanting to share information with the Committee. The country needed to decide how it wanted to deal with matters around SOCs. The DPE was praising Eskom for the 30 days without load shedding because there was a time when Eskom was single handedly being blamed for the country’s economic meltdown, and the country had been threatened with the possibility of a complete blackout. Every milestone therefore had to be celebrated to incentivise all SOCs to do better.

She said the DPE and Denel had gone through a very painful exercise of turning the SOC around, despite the criticisms from the public and from Parliamentary Committees. The DPE was convinced that it would also turn Alexkor around, increasing production.

Ms Modise responded to the questions raised on Transnet. She said the DPE had collaborated with the National Ports Authority to try and deal with anomalies around pricing. It also needed to be put into context that South African ports were not receiving any financial assistance from government, while other governments in the world were assisting their ports. The Ports Regulator, Transnet and the dti were working around this. The Ports Regulator was already making a decision which was now being implemented within Transnet, to address the imbalance between the prices for raw materials and those of finished products. The strategy was being rolled out in a phased approach.

With regard to the issue of the Ports Regulator not being able to regulate port terminals, there were two types of regulators -- the Competition Commission and the Economic Regulator. Transnet’s National Ports Authority was a monopoly infrastructure provider, but Transnet’s Port Terminals operated in a competitive space where it was competing with other service providers. The Competition Commission was therefore responsible for regulation in a competitive space. It would be very difficult for the Economic Regulator to go into the space of the Competition Commission. In other countries, there was concurrent jurisdiction in some instances between the Economic Regulator and the Competition Commission, but South Africa had not yet achieved this type of collaboration.

With regard to the dti’s statement on localization, she said it had been too broad. The Minister had addressed this to a certain extent. Transnet hadreported on all of its localisation initiatives -- all locomotives which were being manufactured now had local content requirements. However, there were still skills which South Africa had to get from abroad because the country did not have these skills. Maybe when dti had made that statement, they had been referring to other SOCs which were not part of the DPE portfolio. With regard to the DPE facilitating meetings between SA Express and other SOCs which were performing well, she said that the DPE did have a chairperson’s forum where the chairpersons and Chief Executive Officers of all SOCs met to share information on good practice.

Mr Hlabisa responded to issues around localization. He said that in 2007 the DPE had introduced the Competitive Supply Development Programme which had aimed to maximise the industrial impact of the build programmes undertaken by SOCs. This had seen significant results in terms of supporting the development of new capabilities within the manufacturing sector, and also making sure that the manufacturing capabilities of SOCs were strengthened and deepened. Transnet in the previous financial year had spent R17.1 billion in supplier development-related contracts, and this had been important for trying to boost the demand for the manufacturing sector. The DPE was making significant progress in maximising the impact of the DPE’s build programme. With regard to issues of supply chain management, the Auditor General had indicated that most of the weaknesses in the supply chain process were being identified by the SOCs themselves, and the SOCs were trying to put together measures to improve. There was, however, still a lot to be done to address issues relating to irregular expenditure and fruitless and wasteful expenditure.

Ms Mokololo responded to the questions around Eskom. She said the DPE welcomed the commending of the Koeberg nuclear power plant. It was also important, however, that the DPE did not become complacent. With regard to the increase in wasteful expenditure, this was one of the key drivers where Eskom was improving on its consequence management. Such issues needed to be dealt with expediently. With regard to the R10.8 million paid, she said remuneration of Eskom was centered on three key pillars -- the retention of talent, rewarding good performance and being competitive in the market. The R10.8 million was for bonuses which had been awarded in 2011/12 and had been paid out only now. These were long term incentives. No short term incentives had been paid out for performance in the previous financial year. With regard to the Medupi strike, she said the overall instability within the labour market would always be a problem for the build programme. The strike which had happened two months ago had led to Eskom following a disciplinary process for over 300 employees, and all strikes following had stemmed from that. Eskom was in partnerships with contractors in those areas to minimize the impact.

Ms Tlale responded to the questions around Denel and supplier development, and said potential suppliers were invited to understand the work Denel was doing, and where they could partner with Denel.

Ms Modise responded to the question around the economic recession and whether SOCs within South Africa were being affected, and said the impact was relative. South Africa was in a bit better position in comparison to other countries-- for example, the situation was so bad in Greece that people were not even able to get money from ATMs, and South Africa was not there yet.

Ms Mokholo responded to questions around the economic outlook, and said SOCs were not investing for themselves, they were investing for the country. Countries had been hit differently by the recession. For example, China was devaluing its currency to see how they could influence their GDP growth. SOCs provided a buffer, because they provided very good investment.

With regard to expenditure levels, she said the DPE had already finalised its quarter one report and the annual report for the 2014/15 financial year, and this would be tabled at the end of September. The intent was to engage the Committee and to come and present them. On presenting on the quarterly performance of SOCs, she said the DPE had presented the annual report for 2014/15, but if the Committee wanted to engage on a quarterly level, the DPE could go back and see where this could be fitted into the Committee’s programme. The DPE did receive quarterly reports from SOCs.

On wasteful expenditure, she said as much as there was a need to do consequence management, there needed to be a healthy balance between the Board, the Executive and junior management. On localization, she said Transnet had done a lot of work on the China contract, where the majority of the locomotives had been manufactured within the country. With regard to SA Express, she said the history the DPE had been referring to was not the political history of the country -- it was the history for the period between 2010 and 2012, where SA Express had performed so badly that there had been a time the DPE had had to write to the Speaker of Parliament to indicate that reports would be tabled late. A lot of work had been done since. The SOC was not regressing, and its annual report would be tabled to the Committee.

The Chairperson thanked the DPE for the presentation and Members for their engagements.

The meeting was adjourned. 

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