HRC must investigate Xingwana's failure to protect the rights of people with disabilities

Note to editors: The following statement was distributed at a press conference held in Parliament today by DA Parliamentary Leader Lindiwe Mazibuko MP, DA Shadow Minister for Women, Children and People with Disabilities Helen Lamoela MP, and the DA representative on the Appropriations Committee, Marius Swart MP and disability activist Marlene le Roux.

Today, the Democratic Alliance (DA) is making a formal submission to the South African Human Rights Commission to request an investigation into the failure of the Department of Women, Children and People with Disabilities (DWCPD) to realise and protect the rights of people with disabilities.

South Africans with disabilities are a vulnerable community often facing both economic marginalisation and multiple forms of discrimination on the basis of their race, gender and specific disability.

When the DWCPD was established by President Jacob Zuma in May 2009, activists and members of the community of people with disabilities saw it as a hopeful sign that the government is serious about supporting the efforts of vulnerable people to live lives that they value.

When the department's mandate was backed by a budget of approximately R142 million per year to coordinate and monitor the direct delivery of programmes to support, empower and develop vulnerable groups, there was an expectation that tangible outcomes will be achieved.

The DA has been monitoring the performance of this department closely.

Poor financial management and inappropriate spending priorities have become the defining characteristic of the DWCPD. The department's failure to effectively spend the budgets in its "Rights of Persons with Disabilities" programme is tantamount to a violation of the rights of South Africans with disabilities.

The mismanagement and skewed spending priorities in the department is evidenced by:

• The fact that the Department's only available Annual Report (for 2010/11) indicates 66% under-spending in its programme for the "Rights of People with Disabilities";
• overspending in the Administration Programme - with reports to the Standing Committee on Appropriations indicating that this programme has already spent 107% of its budget by the third quarter of 2011/12;
• lavish spending on overseas trips: in February 2011, the DWCPD paid approximately R6.8 million for a two-week trip to New York for a delegation of 49 officials (this trip cost the department more than double its actual expenditure in the disabilities programme)
• findings of the Standing Committee on Appropriations that the Department is failing to comply with proper management practices as outlined in the Public Finance Management Act;
• the lack of logical linkages between the objectives, targets and indicators in the Department's operational plans;
• R4 million in unauthorised expenditure and irregular expenditure in excess of R6 million cited in its 2010/2011 annual report;
• evidence from the 3^rd Quarter Expenditure Report for 2011/2012 that the department is set to overspend on salaries, despite a 21% vacancy rate;
• the 3^rd Quarter Expenditure Report for 2011/2012, which indicates that the spending rate of the department is of "major concern" to National Treasury; and

·         the fact that the 2012/2013 budgets for travel and subsistence once again surpassed the total amount budgeted for the disabilities programme.

The DWCPD budget and mandate, and specifically the money attributed to the disabilities programme, should be used to provide opportunities for people with disabilities. Instead, there is overspending on salaries and travel perks and under-spending on the actual work of promoting and protecting the rights of vulnerable South Africans.

The result is that, since the establishment of the Department in 2009, the circumstances of the 5 million South Africans living with disabilities have not improved. If anything, they have worsened:

• Only 1.2 million people (less than a quarter) receive a disability grant.
• 10.5% of the disabled population has no education. The Right to Education for Children with Disabilities campaign recently revealed that more than 165 000 disabled children are out of school.
• The majority of people with disabilities in South Africa are unemployed. Amongst the deaf, the incidence of unemployment is as high as 65%.
• 40% of deaf children do not receive life-changing cochlear ear transplants because of lack of funds.

The Human Rights Commission has a mandate to promote the protection, development and attainment of human rights. The Commission must therefore investigate the failure of the DWCPD to take the rights of people with disabilities seriously.

Statement issued by Helen Lamoela MP, DA Shadow Minister of Women, Children and People with Disabilities, April 16 2012

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