Deputy
Chairperson, it indeed true that the inmates suffer stigma in society, and as a results of the fact that they were jailed. It almost looks like double punishment; because there is also a misunderstanding in society that if you have got a criminal record you can't be employed anywhere. There is no law that says if you were in jail, you can't be employed it is companies and various
policies maybe in government that say if you were a person who was in prison you can't be employed for various reasons. These are things that I think society needs review and look at, to give a second chance to these offenders, because if they are not given a second chance, it also affects them in terms of their future outlook of life.
The other part is that even in our Department of Justice, the other challenge is that some of them, for example is sexual offences, they are in the registrar of offenders, we can't really...this is a difficult category of offenders, you can't take out, because the risk of them doing the same kind of offence is very high, with those kind of offences. We also are looking at that registrar and the process of expungement of some of the criminal records, to help some of the inmates. With the sexual offences, it is a very difficult space because of the reasons I have alluded to earlier on. I think society has welcome and help the offenders. Thank you.
Deputy Chairperson, I will respond to the question in two fold because it's two departments, Justice and Correctional Services. The Department of Justice and Constitutional Development has informed me that the Auditor General has found 12 employees of the department to be directors and members of private companies that are doing
business with the organs of state, from 01 February 2017 to 22 July 2019. The total value of the business by such was about R4,366 242. Some of these employees, I think about three are currently undergoing disciplinary processes, the others, there is still a process that will lead towards whether they should be disciplined or there no need to be taken through that process.
With regards to Correctional Services, the office of the Auditor General had identified 32 employees of the department, found to be directors or members of private companies that are doing business with the state, from 01 February 2017 to 31 March 2019, however the department is in the process of conducting investigation, where applicable disciplinary processes will be undertaken, this is because when you receive the report of the AG, you still have to verify and go through your system to whether indeed the person is your employee, if he or she is whether the conflict was declared and all that processes, so it is still ongoing because of the number that we have. Thank you.