Lim information system flop – dept admits fault

POLOKWANE – The head of the health department, Dr Sipho Kabane for the first time admitted to the Standing Committee on Public Accounts (Scopa) that the department also carried part of the blame for the failure of the provincial health information system (PHIS) that, since 1997, is still not functioning optimally.

Kabane made this admission during an audit report hearing last week. He said some of the modules of the system had now been removed. It was found in 2012 that the department had spent R467 million for consultants to try and get the system 100% operational.

Former MECs and heads of department lay all the guilt of the failure at the feet of consultants and service providers. The system had never worked optimally and 15 of the 24 modules had never been operational due to infrastructural limitations.

The department is still engaged in a court case with a consultant who delivered services to the department as part of the implementation of the system. The department also had to pay over R5 million in interest for not paying invoices between 2007 and March 2008.

Kabane admitted the department did not employ IT specialists to maintain the system as was required from them. A lack of capacity to drive a project of this magnitude and complexity did not exist within the department, the Auditor-General already found in 2013.

Due to budgetary restraints, the department could not appoint four project managers, a qualified programme manager and a technical manger in its IT section to monitor and plan for the system. It did not plan or budget for IT hardware and infrastructure to implement the PHIS.

Kabane said the IT requirements of the department needed to be upgraded urgently.