Outcry kills tender for accountants

The provincial department of education has been forced to withdraw a tender considered favourable to white chartered accountants (CAs).

Sources in the department had questioned the department’s chief financial officer (CFO) and how he designed the tender, which was subsequently cancelled last Wednesday after an outcry from black accountants.

Sources in the department accused the CFO of deliberately designing the requirements – for technical support to assist the chief financial officer with audit outcomes – to exclude black accountants.

Another source said this was a common occurrence, with some tenders’ prerequisites stating that a company needed more than 20 years’ experience.

The “skills transfer lead” in the withdrawn tender would have had to have 20 years’ experience in accounting.

Among other requirements detailed in the tender’s specs were that the “engagement lead” and the “overall project lead” should have 13 years’ and between seven and 10 years’ experience, respectively. The tender’s deadline was set for Thursday.

The Daily Dispatch has seen two letters by the Association of Advancement of Black Accountants of SA (Abasa) and Black Management Forum (BMF) in which the organisations break down how the specs disadvantaged black accountants.

Cuma Dube, BMF’s Eastern Cape secretary, said the specs “exclude 95%” of black chartered accountants in the province. The forum took exception to the listed requirements of 13 years and 20 years experience in the tender specs.

“We raised this issue with the department about the requirements for an engagement lead with 13 years’ public sector experience. It isn’t a job that is overly technical, but the 13-year requirement only serves to be exclusionary of a lot of emerging black CAs,” Dube said.

“If the requirement isn’t of any value, either strategic or operational, then the only other purpose it serves is to exclude [black CAs] because a lot of black CAs, who, looking at our history, do not have 13 to 20years’ experience.”

He said this could be one of the reasons for the migration of skilled labour from the Eastern Cape.

“We are setting the bar unnecessarily too high for the kind of professionals who would like to engage with this work.

“What hope do we have in developing homegrown businesses within the various sectors which government engages, if we are not creating equal opportunities for them to compete for?”

Education spokesperson Loyiso Pulumani confirmed the tender had been cancelled.