Vernie Petersen: Corruption-busting bureaucrat

Cynics might say that Vernie Petersen, who has died in Pretoria at the age of 52, was a victim of the government's policy on corruption in high places.

Petersen was the most effective national commissioner (in effect director-general) the Department of Correctional Services had in the post-apartheid era.

He was a stickler for correct procedure and insisted that things be done by the book.

And when he stopped his boss, then minister Ngconde Balfour, from extending, without putting out to tender, a R270-million catering contract held by a company under investigation by the Special Investigating Unit for tender rigging, he was promptly removed from his position and sent to the Department of Sport and Recreation.

Unlike his predecessors, Petersen, holder of a master's degree in social science from the University of Cape Town and an acknowledged expert on crime and criminal justice, was exceedingly well qualified to be the chief executive officer of the prisons service.

When he was appointed in mid-2007, his skills were desperately needed.

The department was in a chaotic state. It was plagued by rampant sexual violence among prisoners and a high and growing number of unnatural deaths in prison.

Above all, it was riddled with corruption.

Petersen went to war against all this with a vengeance. He suspended senior officers suspected of being on the take and tackled head-on many other issues the authorities had ignored or refused to acknowledge.

His no-nonsense approach began to show results. But while opposition parties and civil society organisations applauded, they also wondered how long he would survive.

Unravelling the corruption that had brought the department to its knees was a "high-risk endeavour", they said.

How long would it be before the "network of entrenched bureaucrats" in the department spun the web that would lead to his downfall?

It was no secret that Balfour had soon come to heartily dislike his national commissioner.

The reasons for this were no secret either. Chief among them was that Petersen had refused to carry out his order to extend, without advertising it, a catering contract held by Bosasa, a black empowerment company headed by former anti-apartheid activist Gavin Watson.

Petersen reported Balfour to the then minister of public service and administration, Geraldine Fraser-Moleketi, and the parliamentary ethics committee for receiving a discount on his Touareg 4x4 from a company with links to Bosasa.

Balfour had Petersen investigated for an allegedly drunken outburst at an official departmental function.

The claims against him were never substantiated, and no steps were taken against him.

Balfour wrote him a letter warning that "something must break" if they could "not trust and work together in the department".

Two months later, in October 2008, Petersen was transferred.

It was believed that Balfour had lobbied the government fiercely for his removal.

The official explanation was that Petersen's expertise was needed to prepare the Department of Sport and Recreation for the 2010 soccer World Cup.

He was director-general of the department until his death from pneumonia.

Petersen is survived by his widow, June, and sons Ruari and Dylan.