17 FALSE QUALIFICATIONS DETECTED IN GAUTENG

Qualification checks have been made on 1013 employees in the Gauteng Provincial Government since 2012, and have uncovered 17 false qualifications.

This is revealed by Gauteng Premier David Makhura in a written reply to my questions in the Gauteng Legislature.

Most of the checks (747) were carried out in the Education department, which found no false qualifications.

Nine out of 20 employees who were checked in the Human Settlements Department were found to have fake qualifications and resigned when disciplinary proceedings were instituted.

Eight false qualifications were found after 100 employees were checked in the Health Department - 6 employees were dismissed and two are still employed.

According to Makhura: "The verification of qualifications is a continuous process (which) is compulsory for newly appointed staff. Departments such as Health are using the services of the Health Professions Council. Other departments are in the process of procuring service providers to conduct qualifications audits in order to eliminate potential fraudulent incidents before they occur."

I agree with Makhura's sentiments in this matter but very few of the 170 000 employees in the provincial government have had their qualifications checked.

It is particularly disturbing that only 100 staff have been checked by the Gauteng Health Department, which has picked up two fake doctors but there may be more.

More senior level personnel need to be checked, and fired if found to have false qualifications.

Statement by Jack Bloom MPL, DA Member of the Oversight Committee on the Premier's Office and Legislature (OCPOL), April 1 2015

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