Joint statement: We need the Inspector General CVs!
3 November 2016
The decision by Parliament’s intelligence committee to withhold the CVs of the candidates for Inspector General of Intelligence is a big step backwards.
In a letter to R2K’s attorneys, JSCI chairperson Charles Nqakula writes that “Curriculum vitaes are of such a nature that their confidential treatment, especially in this process, is reasonable and justifiable in an open and democratic society”.
This is not right. The recent Public Protector appointment process showed how important it is for candidates’ CVs to be public and open to scrutiny. Several of the candidates in that process were members of the intelligence structures, and their CVs were published without any harm. The recent nomination of candidates for the South African Human Rights Commission also met this basic level of transparency.
The formula of holding meetings that are ‘open’ (i.e. the public is allowed to enter the room) is meaningless if they are denied access to the basic information that is being discussed in that meeting. This is not an open meeting. It also means that the public does not have the information it needs to assess and comment on the candidates for the job. We have been down this path before, with three unsuccessful attempts since March 2015 to appoint an Inspector General without the necessary transparency.