CITY OF

CAPE TOWN
ETHICS CODE
Contents

Office of the Mayor – message  2

Office of the City Manager – message  4

1. Purpose and scope

– Our commitment  6

2. Regulatory context
– Good corporate governance  10
– Our compass  11

3. Roles and responsibilities

– Responsibility of City of Cape Town employees  18
– Responsibility of management  20
– Responsibility of ethics function  22

4. Reporting on unethical behaviour  24

5. Enforcing our Ethics Code  28

1
 OFFICE OF
THE MAYOR
– MESSAGE

One of the City’s five strategic pillars – being a

well-run city – focuses on good governance to
ensure that the City remains an efficient, well-
governed and corruption-free administration
that is receptive to the needs of its citizens.

My continued commitment to ethical leadership

and good governance is to increase the ethical
maturity of the City of Cape Town, which reflects
not only a pledge to its values as defined in this
Ethics Code, but also a continuous endeavour
to build and sustain the ethical culture in the
City of Cape Town. In order to do so, one needs
to inculcate ethical decision making into the
day-to-day business activities of each employee,
based on the City’s organisational values.

2
The City of Cape Town continues to be a leader
in the development and institutionalisation of
ethics in local government and has established
its own ethics function under Risk, Ethics
and Governance, which is mandated with
the important role of driving the process
of protecting, nurturing and enhancing the
ethical culture of the City of Cape Town.

Integrity, objectivity and public responsibility

should never be influenced or undermined by
private interests in the course of fulfilling our
official City duties. Each individual must commit
to raising the ethical benchmark by ‘doing the
right thing’, regardless of who is watching. This
should be the one constant in each individual’s
behaviour of ethical conduct, thereby contributing
to the sustainable existence and reputational
prominence of the City of Cape Town.

3
 OFFICE OF THE
CITY MANAGER
– MESSAGE

Applying the principle of accepting responsibility

for actions and taking ownership of the outcomes
is how each and every employee plays an integral
part in building and maintaining a well-run city.

The organisational values as described in this

Ethics Code denote the ethical standards on which
the Constitution of South Africa, the Batho Pele
principles and the Code of Conduct for municipal
staff members are based and aim to achieve.

Therefore, the general conduct of City employees

must give effect to implementing the legislative
framework of the City and performing functions
in good faith, diligently, honestly and in a
transparent manner. The actions and spirit of
employees must purport the basic values and
principles governing local public administration in
a credible manner that does not compromise the
integrity of the municipality.

4
Impartial behaviour when dealing with customers
and fellow employees is therefore critical.

It is these codes, standards and values,

translated into behavioural commitments,
that every employee should strive for in the
performance of his or her daily job function.
I cannot overemphasise the importance of
ethical decision making and value-driven
management in preserving a solid foundation
for an ethical culture to permeate the City.

Let us together continue to display the values of

trust, integrity, accountability, service excellence
and accessibility in order to further strengthen
all five pillars on which the City of Cape Town’s
vision is based and which we can all be proud
of, namely the opportunity city, the safe city, the
caring city, the inclusive city and the well-run city.

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 1. PURPOSE
AND SCOPE
OUR COMMITMENT
This Ethics Code defines the City’s objectives
and corresponding principles of good conduct.
All related Council policies and practices have
been formulated to ensure ethical behaviour
and decision making in the work environment.
This is necessary to ensure that we enhance
and maintain an organisational culture that
places sound ethical values, principles and
responsibilities at the forefront of the City of
Cape Town’s strategies and operations.

The City of Cape Town contributes resources

to social development and welfare. As such,
we have a responsibility to society to be good
corporate citizens, leading by example in
discharging our moral obligations and duties.

6
 In order to do this we
are committed to:

Doing business
ethically – our
core values
This means that we, the
employees of the City of Cape
Town, form or are a part of
an ethical and sustainable
organisation. Our behaviour
and decisions are underpinned
by our core values of trust,
integrity, accountability, service
excellence and accessibility.

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 Trust

Integrity

Service excellence

Accountability

Accessibility

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Committing to trust means that we work as a team and
believe that the other person has our best interests
at heart. Trust makes our relationships effective.

Committing to integrity means that we act with integrity

by being honest and treating everyone with fairness
and respect, while following the rules and applying
them without bias or prejudice. We must ensure that
we refrain from having conflicts of interest, as this
could impact negatively on service excellence, fairness
and objectivity, which are all elements of integrity.

Committing to service excellence means that we strive

for excellence in everything we do by focusing on our
customers and delivering the highest standard of services.

Committing to accountability means that we take

ownership of our roles, accept responsibility for our
actions, and honour our obligations. Furthermore, we carry
out our duties in a professional manner under the laws of
our country and Council’s policies and procedures – thus
always acting within the letter and the spirit of the law.

Committing to accessibility means that we remove

barriers between people and services to increase
the ease of access to services, and that we are
responsive and attentive to customer needs.

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 2. REGULATORY
CONTEXT

GOOD CORPORATE GOVERNANCE

South African corporate governance reports
emphasise that ethics is the foundation of good
corporate governance. The City demonstrates
our commitment and adherence to the
highest levels of good and effective corporate
governance, grounded in our values and ethical
principles, by the adoption of the King Reports.

One of the key objectives of King IV is to

promote corporate governance as integral to
effectively running an organisation to achieve
governance outcomes such as an ethical
culture. Furthermore, King IV introduced a
sector-specific supplement for municipalities
with 16 principles. Two of the 16 principles are
reflective of the aspirations towards ethical and
effective leadership and ethical governance.

10
OUR COMPASS
To realise our purpose as responsible citizens,
we need a compass that gives us direction and
orientates our values and actions. Our compass
consists not only of our values, but also the ethical
principles stemming from the Constitution of
South Africa, the Batho Pele principles and the
Code of Conduct for municipal staff members.

In addition, legislative frameworks, codes,

norms and standards and related criteria
linked to functional roles and professions are
enhancements applicable to municipal staff.

11
 The Constitution of South Africa
This Ethics Code, as well as all related
Council policies and procedures, promote
and seek to implement the basic values
and principles of public administration
as described in Section 195(1) of the
Constitution of South Africa, namely that:

• a high standard of professional ethics

be promoted and maintained;
• the efficient, economic and effective
use of resources be promoted;
• public administration be
development-oriented;
• services be provided impartially,
fairly, equitably and without bias;
• people’s needs be responded to,
and the public be encouraged to
participate in policy making;
• public administration be accountable;
• transparency be fostered by providing
the public with timely, accessible
and accurate information;

12
• good human resource management and
career development practices, to maximise
human potential, be cultivated; and
• public administration be broadly
representative of the South African people,
with employment and personnel management
practices based on ability, objectivity, fairness,
and the need to redress the imbalances of
the past to achieve broad representation.

13
 The Batho Pele principles
Aligned with the aforementioned constitutional
ideals are the eight Batho Pele principles that
were developed in respect of service delivery
and putting ‘people first’ in the public service.

These are:
• consultation;
• setting service standards;
• increasing access;
• ensuring courtesy;
• providing information;
• openness and transparency;
• redress; and
• value for money.

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15
 The Code of Conduct for
municipal staff members
The Code of Conduct for municipal staff
members, as set out in Schedule 2 of the
Municipal Systems Act, Act 32 of 2000, depicts
due process required in terms of compliance
with legislation and the related policies and
procedures of the City of Cape Town.

While the said code primarily communicates the

rules that employees must adhere to, many of our
policies stem directly or indirectly from the values
that the City of Cape Town and its employees
stand for. It sets the clear intention of these core
values and principles, which each employee must
apply in their decision making when carrying out
their duties as a City of Cape Town employee.

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The Code of Conduct for municipal
staff members requires that employees
of a municipality must at all times:
• loyally execute the
lawful policies of the
municipal council;
• perform the functions
of office in good faith,
diligently, honestly and in
a transparent manner;
• act in such a way that the
spirit, purport and objects
of Section 50 are promoted;
CODE OF
• act in the best interest of the CONDUCT
municipality and in such a
way that the credibility and
integrity of the municipality
are not compromised; and
• act impartially and treat
all people, including other
staff members, equally
without favour or prejudice.

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 3. ROLES AND
RESPONSIBILITIES
The institutionalisation of ethics in the
City takes place with top-down processes
(leadership) and bottom-up processes
(grassroots consultation and commitment).

RESPONSIBILITY OF CITY OF
CAPE TOWN EMPLOYEES
When carrying out our professional duties for
the City of Cape Town, we as employees are
expected to conduct ourselves in a manner
consistent with inter alia, the Constitution, the
core values of trust, integrity, accountability,
service excellence and accessibility and the ethical
standards of the Code of Conduct for municipal
staff members. As such, all employees must
comply with and respect all rules, legislation and
policies underpinning good ethical conduct.

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 CIT Y OF
C APE TOW
ETHIC S CO N
DE

It is the responsibility of
each individual to familiarise
themselves with the content and
intention of this Ethics Code.

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 RESPONSIBILITY OF MANAGEMENT
While codes and policies for compliance are
one aspect, continued ethical behaviour (visible
leadership) driven from the top is important to
achieve widespread support for ethical values.

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Management buy-in to ethics programmes
and initiatives, and the identification of
departmental ethics champions will help drive
the intended ethical conduct in the organisation
through actions, decisions and behaviours.

Management must provide assistance and

guidance to subordinates with the application
of this Ethics Code, the organisational
values, the Code of Conduct for municipal
staff members, related policies and
procedures, including functional roles and
professional ethos enhancements.

Management is encouraged to place pertinent

ethical issues on departmental/section
meeting agendas for open discussion.

21
 RESPONSIBILITY
OF ETHICS
FUNCTION
The City of Cape
Town has taken active
measures to ensure
that the Code of
Conduct for municipal
staff members and
its underpinning
values are adhered to
in all aspects of our
business by means
of Council policies
and procedures.

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In addition, the processes to embed workplace
ethics include, but are not limited to:
• ethics awareness for new employees;
• anti-corruption and ethics awareness
training for existing staff;
• broad-based dialogue on ethics;
• communication and articles on ethical matters;
• mechanisms for confidential
disclosure and reporting of ethical
issues that require investigation;
• advisory service on ethical dilemmas or
matters requiring interpretation of ethics-
related policies and procedures;
• collaboration on and sharing of best
practices with other institutions;
• monitoring the ethical culture, risk profile
and Ethics Action Plan of the City;
• reporting on organisational ethics and
the ethics programme of the City; and
• monitoring of and coordinating with
role-players/stakeholders regarding
the processes relating to declaration
of interests, applications to undertake
private work and gift receiving.

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 4. REPORTING
ON UNETHICAL
BEHAVIOUR
Each employee of the City of Cape Town has an
obligation to report possible violations of the
Ethics Code, Code of Conduct for municipal
staff, Council policies and laws. Reporting of
such instances must be done in good faith.

The City is committed to the highest standards

of openness, integrity and accountability
with the aim to promote a culture in which
employees feel able to raise genuine and
valid concerns without fear of victimisation,
discrimination or disadvantage.
The following City documents apply:

a) Whistle-blowing Policy
b) Fraud Prevention Policy and Fraud Response Plan
c) P
 rivate Work and Declaration of Interests
Standard Operating Procedure
d) Supply Chain Management Policy
e) R
 ewards, Gifts, Favours and Hospitality
System and Procedure

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a) Whistle-blowing Policy
• Protects whistle-blowers against
victimisation and harassment.

• Members of the public and service providers

are encouraged to raise concerns about the
City’s activities so that it can be investigated
and appropriate action can be taken. Reporting
via the fraud hotline at 0800 32 31 30 or
[email protected] can be
done anonymously.

The City will not accept any level of unethical

behaviour. This not only includes fraud, theft,
corruption and maladministration (as defined
in the Fraud Prevention Policy), but any other
behaviour that transgresses our values and
standards of ethical conduct, such as not declaring
conflicts of interest, the unauthorised disclosure
of confidential or privileged information, sexual
harassment, the unfair treatment of and disrespect
towards colleagues, stakeholders and members
of the public, and the misuse of Council property.

25
 b) Fraud Prevention Policy
and Fraud Response Plan
Apply to all incidences of fraud, corruption, theft
and maladministration (as defined in the Fraud
Prevention Policy) or suspected irregularities
of this nature involving, but not limited to:

• employees of the City; and

• consultants, suppliers, contractors

and other providers of goods
and services to the City.

c) Private Work and Declaration of

Interests Standard Operating Procedure
Applies to all employees and is intended to
ensure employees comply with the legislative
requirements relating to declaration of interests
and applications to undertake private work.

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d) Supply Chain Management Policy
Supply chain management ethical standards,
as contained in the Supply Chain Management
(SCM) Policy, apply to officials and all role-
players in the supply chain management
system and are intended to ensure fairness and
objectivity in the SCM processes of the City.

e) Rewards, Gifts, Favours and

Hospitality System and Procedure
To guide and protect employees against
unintentional transgressions or improper
influence relating to gift receiving (including
favours and benefits), it is Council’s policy
that all employees report any gift received
or offered to them, irrespective of value.

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 5. ENFORCING
OUR ETHICS CODE
Appropriate disciplinary action, including but
not limited to potential dismissal or criminal
charges, will be taken against any employee
whose conduct violates the Ethics Code, Code
of Conduct for municipal staff and all related
policies, procedures, applicable laws and
regulations. Anyone knowingly making a false
report of alleged ethics violations will be subject
to disciplinary action. Similarly, anyone victimising
an employee who reported unethical behaviour in
good faith will be subjected to disciplinary action.

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29
ETHICS THROUGH LEADERSHIP

Speaking out and reporting

unethical behaviour.

Reporting of such instances

must be done in good faith and
can be done anonymously to
the hotline 0800 32 31 30 or
[email protected]