who have registered with the Department of Public Service Management (DPSM).
The Gazette understands that some candidates had their interviews cancelled or were turned down at an advanced stage of recruitment as a result of the directive.
Speaking to The Gazette, DPSM Public Relations Officer, Matlapeng Kgotlele, confirmed that a directive “was issued around June instructing Ministries and their departments to pick from a list of students who have registered with us.”
He acknowledged that at some stage some Ministries and their departments cancelled interviews for candidates because they had not consulted them.
“We told them to go ahead with those who had been shortlisted, offered jobs or interviewed. But the good thing is that even those whose interviews were cancelled prior to the consultations were selected because a number had registered with us,” he said.
More than 2000 graduates have registered and Matlapeng said the selection exercise is ongoing. “Government Ministries and their departments send teams to come and select those suitable for the posts. We do not subject the graduates to interviews as some are trainable and they are recruited at point of entry,” he said.
Matlapeng revealed that they encountered a situation whereby some of the graduates were unable to produce certificates when requested to do so.
“On initiation the Ministries or their departments demand certificates and some of these graduates were unable to produce certificates. They produced strange documents. It is easy to submit applications online but when requested to produce certificates by various Ministries and their departments a few were unable to do so,” said Kgotlele.   He would neither deny nor confirm if some of the hopefuls may have forged documents.
The Gazette is reliably informed that some applicants submitted applications ‘out of desperation.’ A source also said one of the applicants threatened DPSM when her application was turned down and the DPSM threatened to bring the police as the hopeful was believed to have forged some documents.
“Some people have stayed for a long time without a job. Some of them are desperate to and there is a likelihood that they ma forge documents in order to be selected,” said the source.
Kgotlele said the bulk of the graduates who had registered with DPSM had completed their degrees as far back as 2004. “We believe that this is a group that was sent to South Africa after Tirelo Sechaba was terminated,” he said.  
BY KHONANI ONTEBETSE