Home Affairs' ID turnaround should be replicated

The Times Editorial: The turnaround strategy at the embattled Department of Home Affairs has notched up another success. Two months ago, the department announced that it had received just one qualification from the Auditor-General this year, compared to four during the 2008/09 financial year, and a disclaimer in 2007.

This week, Talk Radio 702 reported that a turnaround by the section of the department that produces identity documents has been hailed by no less an institution than Princeton University in the US, whose Innovations for Successful Societies institute has published a paper on the process. Whereas previously it used to take, on average, about four months to get an ID book, the turnaround time now is less than 60 days, according to the report.

Crucially, the sea change was not achieved through wholesale and costly purges of incompetent or lazy officials. Nor was it predicated upon the purchasing of expensive hi-tech equipment.

Instead, an effective performance management system was implemented through consultants in partnership with Home Affairs head office staffers to accomplish a very simple objective - ensuring that the public servants do their jobs properly.

Home Affairs is far from fixed.

While the passport logjam has reportedly been cleared, security processes improved and a track-and-trace system implemented, the department concedes that not all its offices are functioning properly. Corruption is still a concern, projects to upgrade networks and implement electronic file management and identification systems are not complete, and many vacancies have yet to be filled.

But the beauty of the turnaround in the ID process is that it can be replicated in other sections and offices - not to mention other government departments.