Cape Town - Players in the oil industry, the major oil groups in particular, are concerned that government departments and other institutions are ignoring the strides made in the Liquid Fuels Charter, the first black empowerment industry charter, when it comes to awarding government tenders.
This was raised last week by the SA Petroleum Industry Association (Sapia) in a submission to the parliamentary committee reviewing the Preferential Procurement Policy Finance Act.
Colin McClelland, the executive director of Sapia, said the success of empowerment initiatives would depend on government departments adopting a uniform approach on empowerment when awarding tenders.
Siviwe Mafanya, the chief executive of black-owned Afric Oil - which is not a member of Sapia - said government departments still had to prove to him that they supported the charter. Some municipalities also did not take the charter into account when awarding tenders.
The parastatals tended to take the charter into account when making tender awards, perhaps because these tended to operate more along private-sector business lines, he said.
The cabinet decided last week that it would amend the Preferential Procurement Policy Finance Act to make it more broad-based, rather than focusing on share equity, so that it could be aligned with the empowerment legislation of the department of trade and industry.
Sapia's members include BP, Caltex, Engen, PetroSA, Sasol, Shell and Total.
The charter was signed in November 2000 by Sapia, each of its member firms, the African Minerals and Energy Forum, Afric Oil, Exel Petroleum, the department of minerals and energy, the ministry of minerals and energy, the Central Energy Fund and African Minerals Petroleum, among others.
A ministerial empowerment evaluation committee has been formed to evaluate company compliance with the charter on a five-point scale, with one representing firms that exceed the charter requirements and five representing companies that had substantially failed to meet the commitments of the charter.