ACC STAFF WANTS BETTER SALARIES

MBABANE – Officers of the Anti Corruption Commission (ACC) want to be paid more than the country’s civil servants.

This is contained in a report compiled by the Open Society Initiative for Southern Africa, which analyses effectiveness of the Anti Corruption Agencies in the SADC region.
These include Angola, Botswana, DRC, Lesotho, Malawi, Mozambique, Namibia, South Africa, Swaziland, Zambia and Zimbabwe.

According to Wikipedia, a civil servant or public servant is a person employed in the public sector for a government department or agency.
The report was launched last week in Johannesburg, where officials from the said States were in attendance.

Swaziland was represented by Jabu Phakathi, the ACC’s Public Relations Officer (PRO). Former judge Maxine Langwenya was also in attendance.
In the report, among other things, the ACC laments the fact that it does not have enough funds, has shortage of staff and a high staff turnover.

“Staff members must be incentivised by higher salaries than those of civil servants. Their terms and conditions of service must also be reviewed to provide them with accommodation in government houses,” reads part of the report.
The commission also submitted that there was an insufficient budget allocated by government, hence a need to grant the commission independence in budget related matters.

The ACC wants to be funded from the Consolidated Fund and be permitted to mobilise resources in order to meet all its programmes.
The lack of funding from government also downplays the commission’s wish to have secure and decentralised offices.
This makes the team inaccessible to the majority of people who might want to report acts of corruption by visiting these offices.

The matter of investigators allegedly arresting people to settle personal or political scores and to embarrass was also highlighted.
“The ACC must actively market itself to address the perception that it makes arrests to embarrass and settle personal scores. This requires that its website be updated and be made user friendly and that its offices be decentralised. The commission must make its report  public and accessible, without charging a fee and must be more visible for educational purposes, not only when making arrests,” reads the report.

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