Having a strong sense of ethics leads to success

ETHICS and integrity are the fundamental cornerstones on which SA’s economy needs to be built and fighting corruption is essential for healthy, sustainable economic growth.

Naren Bhojaram, president of Consulting Engineers SA (Cesa), says when it comes to ethics and transparency, SA ranks 4,1 out of 10 on Transparency International’s index (zero being the worst and 10 being the best), showing that there is much room for improvement.

“As a consequence, people are often sceptical about investing in this country as we are not showing ourselves as being particularly trustworthy and we are on the back foot when it comes to attracting direct foreign investment,” says Bhojaram.

He says ethics and integrity have a direct influence on the environment in which consulting engineers operate.

The projects on which consulting engineers are employed have an impact on the society they serve. Not only are health and safety paramount but, given the limited resources that can be allocated, projects must also be cost effective. All South Africans unknowingly rely on this country’s community of engineers and their ethics and integrity.

“The influence consulting engineers have on each project is significant and while our fees might be 10%-12% of the initial project value, over the life cycle cost of the project those fees are about 2%.

“Therefore, the consulting engineers’ work must be optimised right from the beginning. The work we do is based on our professional qualifications, experience and our code of conduct and we have to design and oversee projects that are built to perform,” says Bhojaram.

He says corruption leeches away resources that should go into SA’s infrastructure projects.

“Policies are in place throughout the private and public sectors, but business integrity issues still arise as each person has his or her own ethical balance and people often allow themselves to justify their actions.”

Cesa has a zero-tolerance policy with regard to corruption and it is a condition of Cesa membership that firms abide by its code of conduct.

A key element of the code of conduct is Cesa’s business integrity management system developed by the International Federation of Consulting Engineers. The system provides some high level do’s and don’ts and looks at internal and external issues, such as the manner in which firms bill for their time and their working relationships with clients.

“Our system provides our members with objective guidance that warns them when they might be stepping over the line,” says Bhojaram.

Turning to the progress SA is making in developing fair and honest public sector procurement processes, he says SA has come a long way, but some areas still need work.

For example, the government has gone a long way in separating powers and functions in local government with tender and bid evaluation committees. However, the committees are made up of local authority employees and in some cases they do not have sufficient knowledge and experience to carry out their evaluation tasks.

“As a result, some committees end up being quite weak and open to outside influence and business integrity issues continue to occur.

“On other hand, there are municipalities, government departments and parastatals that have strong committees with good financial, technical and legal skills and expertise and their decision making is of a high quality.”