House Chairperson, may I just respond to hon Shinn and correct what she said. What we advised hon Shinn was that when the Ministry ...
... njengehhovisi likaNgqongqoshe akuthina esiqondisa izigwegwe eMnyangweni. Umsebenzi wokuqondisa izigwegwe, ngokomthetho ubekwe ngaphansi koMqondisi-Jikelele; njengoMnyango asigxambukeli. Esakusho kuyena ukuthi akalinde size sithole umbiko. Uma sesiwutholile umbiko siyokuza ekomidini sibike futhi sibikele nezwe ukuthi siwuphatha kanjani lo mcimbi. (Translation of isiZulu paragraph follows.)
[... it is not us, in the office of the Minister, who conduct disciplinary processes in the department. Procedurally, disciplinary processes are the responsibility of the office of the Director-General; we do not interfere as the department. What we said to her is that she should wait until we receive a report. We will come to the committee once we have received the report, and we will then report to the whole nation how we handled this matter.]
In short, we advised that the responsibility of conducting any disciplinary hearing lies squarely in the hands of the accounting officer, who is the director-general. We didn't have the report. We advised the member to wait until we are given the report so that we can respond to the committee and to all members.
We also advised that, because of the seniority of those involved in this disciplinary hearing, they should follow all procedures to the letter. The disciplinary process should be fair to all those who are undergoing the disciplinary process, and the department must ensure that it has the necessary capacity to conduct the disciplinary hearings. Also, disciplinary activists themselves should not disrupt the programmes of the department.
So, we are still awaiting the report. Up till today, I still don't have the report from the department. All that I have been hearing is speculation in the media. Until we have the report we cannot comment on the outcomes of the disciplinary hearings. Thank you very much.