Parliament wants to know how many of the Passenger Rail Agency of South Africa's (Prasa) employees have been involved in disciplinary cases over the past five years - but iot doesn't have figures available.
Now Prasa has asked its employees to volunteer details of any and all disciplinary cases or hearings they were part of because of its inadequately kept records. The deadline is today.
Prasa's communications department states in an internal letter: "We have been asked by the portfolio committee of transport to give the status of disciplinary cases, we are however struggling to complete and submit the information due to substantial information begin missing from the files."
The department goes on to ask all employees to "declare" and "give a full account of any and all" charges levelled against them over the past five years. "Please cover the following: what charges were levelled against you? Whether any disciplinary hearings were held? Status of the matter and what was the outcome?"
The organisation wants a "comprehensive submission" with supporting documents.
Chris Hunsinger, deputy spokesperson on transport for the Democratic Alliance (DA), says this again shows the extent to which Prasa has been mismanaged. "It is clear it is an organisation where structures aren't in place and processes not working. We always thought the biggest problems are with procurement, but it is increasingly clear human resources is a major issue. For example,Prasa has six chief financial officers!"
The auditor-general (AG) has given Prasa an unqualified audit for the 2015/'16 financial year, even though it racked up more than R13 billion in fruitless and wasteful expenditure. There are also 40 criminal investigations being conducted due to alleged criminal activities and mismanagement.
The AG found that internal procedures were often not followed and that various departments simply didn't keep records.