Picture the scene. A bearded man kneels before his bed and utters this prayer to a deity of his choosing. "Dear God (name chosen for convenience), please can you make sure that the brilliant work I do as minister of trade and industry has a long and positive impact on this wonderful country called South Africa." Now God, who is not one to answer prayers directly, decides to offer Rob a little bit of advice to ensure that Rob's legacy is ensured. God replies (in a clear, impressive voice)
Rob - get rid of the twits who draft your BEE charters and then perhaps people won't talk about you at all when you are unceremoniously fired from your job. Yes Rob, most people think you are incompetent and by surrounding yourselves with a courtroom full of idiots you are perpetuating this perception.
Alas - Rob doesn't read this blog or the daily press and continues to employ the Andiles of this world as advisers. And so his name ends up on these shambolic documents. What is of course so strange is that Rob is happy to gazette a myriad dodgy charters and yet will not gazette the only one that makes sense, has been spell-checked and is properly thought out - viz the FSC.
I have now had the privilege of looking through the ICT Charter because I have clients that will need to start looking at it soon. Besides the glaring errors in spelling, grammar etc there is this mistaken belief that if you put up the targets then you will "accelerate the pace of transformation in the sector". Id est (page 21)
The ICT Sector Codes deviates (sic) from the Generic Codes on the ownership target which has been increased to 30%. The substance of the deviation of the ICT sector Code from the Codes of Good Practice (25.1% +1) is the recognition by the ICT sector to accelerate the pace of transformation in the sector, thus ensuring more companies in (verb missing) the hands of black people. The ICT sector believes that given the pace of transformation and black ownership in the sector, it may take longer to bring about real transformation in the sector if the sector is to adopt the 25%+ 1 compliance target. Tllis is also to recognize the uniqueness of the ICT sector and that it cannot be treated as any other sector, hence the deviation from the compliance target in the codes of good practice.
Don't you just love this? Make the targets higher so that people will transform quicker!! What profound form of logic is this? That people aren't really going for the 25% in the rest of the economy is somewhat missed. Rob loves this - he thinks that people will transform faster if you deduct points off their scorecard. God - would you like to reconsider your suggestion to Rob, perhaps you might tell him that there is no hope for him and his legacy.
Here is the scorecard summarised. I double checked it - but if you come across Rob-like mistakes in it please don't blame him, it's my fault. Let me know and I'll fix it up.
In the ICT charter Socio-Economic Development becomes cheaper per BEE point: From 1% of NPAT for 5 points to 1.5% of NPAT for 12 points.
On the other hand Enterprise Development becomes more expensive: From 3% of NPAT for 15 points to 5% of NPAT for 11 points.
Judged by the criteria that the DTI should be encouraging the development of small business this looks like insanity - or am I missing something profound?
Posted by: Richard Ferrer | July 11, 2012 at 12:13 PM
No you're smack on the money here. Even though this is completely nonsensical I think the industry might go for it because of the other elements.
Posted by: Paul Janisch | July 11, 2012 at 07:51 PM