Arch Duke of South Africa’s internet, Arthur Goldstuck has filed a shocking report on his website, detailing the breakdown of costs for the planning, construction of the Free State Government website, which was reported to have cost R140 million, a figure that Free State director general Elzabe Rockman said was actually something more like R40 million.

What a weight off our collective shoulders.

Meanwhile, a spokesperson for the Free State provincial governement has claimed that the budget for the succesful tender document was cleared by the auditor general.

A total of 38 websites, and not only one, form part of the Free State’s multi-year integrated website project, the provincial government said on Tuesday.

“In total, 38 reengineered websites form part of this project, including the provincial government’s utilisation of social media platforms such as Facebook and Twitter,” said spokeperson Mondli Mvambi.

The project included websites for the 11 provincial departments, three provincial public entities and 24 municipalities.

The consortium of Cherry Online, Ikamva ICT, and Jugganaut, was appointed to deal with design, research, content development and generation in the first phase of the project, according to documents signed by Elzabe Rockman in February 2012.

But after extrapolating the figures listed in the budget of the now-public tender-award document, Goldstuck concludes that the total cost of the website over less than three years will be R97 809 408, and some change.

The budget gives a break down of four phases prior to “implementation” (going live with the website), followed by implementation, maintenance and “content generation and management.

Here’s an excerpt from Goldstuck’s analysis:

Phase one, for “planning, conceptualization, research & information development”, allocates the following funds for financial year 2011/12:

“R350 000 per site for departments and Metro;

R300 000 per site for larger Local Municipalities;

R200 000 per site for Entities and District Municipalities;

R150 000 per site for other Local Municipalities”.

The Free State Provincial Government comprises 11 departments, including the Office of the Premier. Along with the Metro, the first line item therefore comprises 12 sites, for a total cost of R4 200 000.

The Free State province comprises 19 local municipalities, of which 6 could be described as “larger” (those that include the larger Free State towns, namely Kroonstad, Welkom Sasolburg, Parys, Harrismith and Bethlehem). The second line item, based on this outline, comes to R1 800 000.

The province includes four “District Municipalities”, which are in effect umbrella bodies for the 19 local municipalities. The Entities refer to statutory bodies, of which there are four: Free State Tourism Authority, Free State Gambling and Liquor Board, Free State Development Corporation and Centlec, the local electricity authority in Bloemfontein. Based on these municipalities and entities, thethird line item amounts to R1 600 000.

A total of  13 “other Local Municipalities” are not included in the second line item, making for a cost, in the fourth line item, of  R1 950 000.

The total cost, then, of planning the Free State government website was R9 550 000.

Phase Two, for “Design”, also allocated to the 2011/12 financial year, included the same line items, with the same costing. In other words, the Design of the site/s cost exactly as much as the planning: a total of R9 550 000.

The allocation for Phase Three, the “Development and Creation” of the site/s, was R1 100 000.

Phase Four, for “Testing”, was open-ended, specifying “R900 per hour x 10 persons”. Assuming, very conservatively, that three 8-hour days were allocated for testing, this would have amounted to a relatively humble R216 000. No ceiling was placed on this amount, however, and it could be ten times as high.

Phase Five, for “Implementation”, which appeared to be something other than design, development, creation and testing, was given a budget of R413 600.

The total for the first five phases is R20 829 600, simply to get the site/s up and running.

CLICK HERE to read the rest of his report.

[Source : Gadget, Mail & Guardian]