SWAKOPMUND – The profitability of commercial public enterprises improved from N$840 million to N$1.9 billion from 2016 to date, Public Enterprises Minister Leon Jooste said here yesterday.

The profitability of financial institutions and extra-budgetary funds improved from N$633 million to N$760 million over the same period, while non-commercial public enterprises showed an improvement from minus N$87 million to a positive N$1.21 billion.

Jooste was speaking during the opening of the two-day public enterprise conference in Swakopmund, themed “Performance monitoring: Unleashing public enterprises’ potential”.

The aim of the conference is to reflect on the operations, performances and performance management of public enterprises. Several private sector executives also shared their experiences in terms of management with the about 100 executives attending the conference.

Addressing various CEOs of parastatals during the opening, Jooste said that the total wage bill for the 17 464 public enterprises employees currently stands at N$8.5 billion per annum.
This, he says translates into 28 percent, of the total public enterprises expenditure of N$30 billion per annum. 

“This is beyond the average 27 percent of other African countries and of concern to the ministry. It is only once one understands what is wrong and what has caused it that one can conceptualise appropriate solutions,” Jooste explained.

He added that public enterprises were created to perform critical functions but many, with the exception of a few, have failed to optimally deliver on the mandate they were created for.

“In some instances, instead of public enterprises supporting the generation of revenue for the State, they have in fact, become a burden to the State by depending on annual government subsidies and guarantees to sustain their operations. For 2018/19 alone, public enterprises received a total allocation from the budget of N$4.024 billion,” Jooste explained.