Plan to blacklist more South African companies – with 52 already confirmed
Public Works and Infrastructure Minister Dean Macpherson has reiterated his department’s clampdown on non-compliant contractors, with 52 already blacklisted, and more are likely to follow.
Speaking in an interview with HOT1027FM, Macpherson said the government’s blacklisting of 52 companies is part of a much broader effort to clean up public procurement.
The aim is to tighten oversight and stop underperforming contractors from continuing to win state work.
Macpherson explained that the blacklisted firms were removed for various failures, which included failures to adhere to the contracts to which they were appointed and work quality issues.
In some issues, companies and their staff simply walked off-site and didn’t complete the contracted projects.
He said the problems differ from case to case, but argued that at the heart of all is project management.
“It’s a result, in my assessment, of a failure to project manage, not only the development itself, but also the various contractors involved,” he said.
He said the scale of the latest action shows how much tougher enforcement has become. “Between 2002 and 2024, only two contractors had been blacklisted by the Construction Industry Development Board,” he said.
“In the last 18 months, we have now blacklisted 52.” According to Macpherson, this shows a lot more work is being done to ensure that we derive value for money.
Macpherson said contractors doing public work should view it as an act of service and something to be proud of, rather than just a demand or expectation.
However, he added that improving outcomes will require far stronger project controls from the start. “If we properly manage these projects, then those warning signs will be there,” he said.
He also flagged government payment practices as part of the problem, and said the use of large upfront payments can leave the state exposed.
“This thing of prepayments also baffles me. We do prepayments sometimes in large amounts of money, and then we wonder why people don’t deliver,” he said.
Blacklisting the tip of the iceberg
He said the government needs a better system that can both support contractors and “protect our interests, which is the money that taxpayers give us to build these projects.
On concerns that blacklisted firms may simply reappear under new names, Macpherson said the department is trying to close that loophole.
“We then submit the names of the companies and the directors to the National Treasury, so that we ensure that they aren’t able to resurface somewhere else,” he said.
He added that, through the construction action plan adopted with all nine provinces last year, this information is also shared across provincial governments through a database.
Macpherson said the blacklisting of 52 companies is only one part of a much larger reform agenda.
“We will be looking at the entire value chain from procurement to award and to completion. The department is embarking on a radical overhaul in how we procure,” he said.
One of the key parts of this reform will be matching projects to appropriately qualified contractors.
Working with the Construction Industry Development Board, Macpherson said the department wants stricter use of contractor grading.
He said the crackdown will also continue beyond blacklisting. “We need to then start holding them civilly liable for costs that have had to be borne by the state as a result of their inaction,” he said.
Macpherson noted that the department is working with the Special Investigating Unit (SIU) to recover funds, and has already had success in “a number of cases” where money has been recouped.
Macpherson said the department is committed to pursuing those cases because visible consequences are essential to deter others who might follow.
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