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Leonard Ncube, Victoria Falls Reporter
PRESIDENT Mnangagwa has launched Performance Contracts for Heads of Government Ministries in effort to ensure maximum participation of every public service worker towards realisation of Vision 2030.

Launching the Performance Contracts for Heads of Ministries and the E-enabled Whole of Government Performance Management System yesterday, President Mnangagwa said the achievement of Vision 2030 is based on Government undertaking various public sector reforms to re-engineer and re-invigorate its institutions, systems and processes.

He said the launch of the Performance Contracts marks an incredible milestone in the history of the country’s public sector.

The new system is envisaged to result in robust public sector institutions and a leadership that is results focused in line with aspiration of the Second Republic.

This comes at a time the country is accelerating the attainment of Vision 2030 through consolidating gains recorded under the Transitional Stabilisation Programme (TSP) which has been replaced with the National Development Strategy (NDS1) stretching from 2021 to 2025.

President Mnangagwa said it will not be business as usual, adding that bureaucracy and pompous public servants have no place in the Second Republic.

“A Performance Contract is a tool that we have opted for as Government. This is a negotiated performance agreement between Government, acting as the owner of an agency and the Permanent Secretary acting as the management for the agency. It specifies what needs to be achieved, expected levels of achievement, timeliness and reporting modalities.

The Performance Contract organises and defines tasks so that management can perform them systematically, purposefully and with reasonably probability of the achievement, thereby making it possible to measure the performance of a public institution, the performance of the manager and the performance of Government,” said President Mnangagwa.

He said the Second Republic is about action and results hence activities should be streamlined accordingly to make the positive and lasting impacts for the growth of the economy and overall improved quality of life for people.

The President said it is a constitutional provision for the State to adopt and implement policies and legislation that develop efficiency, competency, accountability, transparency, personal integrity and financial probity in all institutions and agencies of Government at every level.

“We thus have a constitutional obligation to be performance driven and result oriented. In pursuit of this Constitutional requirement and also driven by the desire to deal effectively with the traditional problems of bureaucratic lethargy, my Government is implementing various economic and governance reforms to strengthen the performance management throughout the public sector. Bureaucracy and old ways of doing business and resolving problems have no place under the Second Republic.

“The launch of the Performance Contracts for Heads of Ministries and the E-enabled Whole of Government Performance Management System is an important intervention by my Government for the achievement of Vision 2030 and implementation of these Performance Contracts marks a new paradigm in the transformative agenda to achieve the Vision,” said President Mnangagwa.

He said three Apex Agencies which are the Office of the President and Cabinet, the Public Service Commission and the Ministry of Finance and Economic Development will coordinate and drive the agenda.

“The achievement of Vision 2030 is predicated on Government undertaking of various public sector reforms to re-engineer and re-invigorate its institutions, systems and processes. Performance contracting is thus one of the cocktails of reform measures we continue to undertake.

“To that end I have put in place co-ordination architecture at the centre of Government. This architecture is known as the Tripartite High Level Forum on Public Sector Reforms and Management,” said the President.

He said the roles of the Tripartite will include the Chief Secretary to the President and Cabinet providing overall policy and strategic direction to the entire Government machinery; chairman of the Public Service Commission ensuring that there is requisite human resource strategy to achieve Vision 2030 while the Secretary for Finance will provide the necessary resources to execute NDS1 in conformity with the Programme Based Budgeting and other Fiscal Policy provisions.

President Mnangagwa said the Performance Contracts will lead to improved efficiency in service delivery by ensuring accountability in public offices, ensuring that performance and results link with stakeholder expectation and increased customer satisfaction.

There is also a desire for improved performance and efficiency in resource utilisation and ensuring that public resources are focused on the attainment of key national priorities, institutionalisation of a performance and results-oriented culture in the public sector, ability to link reward for work done to performance and to enhance good governance.

The use of performance management has even become imperative under Covid-19, said the President.

He said Performance Contracting will also be extended to heads of parastatals and state enterprises, local authorities and the public in view of the Devolution agenda that seeks to promote the development of provincial economies.

“As we move forward, this process will be elevated to include Cabinet Ministers in line with the Whole of Government Approach to programming. In all these processes, the active participation of citizens and other stakeholders will be taken into account as the overall performance rating of each individual Permanent Secretary will also incorporate inputs from the public,” he said.

“As we implement this reform measure, special attention will be given to the key success factors such as mindset change and joint programming between ministries. I urge ministries to incorporate and support inventions and innovations being developed by our institutions of higher education in their processes.”

The President said once signed, the Performance Contracts will be uploaded into the Whole of Government Performance Management System for online monitoring and evaluation.

He said there will be a robust implementation of Client Serviced Charters and other public sector mechanisms that allow for interface between Government and the public.

President Mnangagwa reminded public sector workers to always serve people humbly and wholeheartedly, adding that under the Second Republic, there is no room for heads of ministries who are pompous, proud and self centred or those who prioritise their own benefits ahead of delivering services to the people.

He challenged heads of departments to familiarise themselves with Government policies such as the Zimbabwe Investment Development Agency (Zida).
-@ncubeleon