President Thabo Mbeki's International Advisory Council on Information Society and Development (PIAC on ISAD) wants a scorecard that reflects which of its recommendations to the South African government have been implemented.
This comes as the body prepares to engage with a new government next year, with the country heading for a general election in 2009.
Following a meeting over the weekend, PIAC and the president jointly decided that the Department of Communications (DOC) would be responsible for appointing a person or persons to assess the work done since PIAC's establishment.
"The president emphasised that we need a committee to look at the decisions taken and to make sure they are implemented," explains DOC spokesman Albi Modise. "You can't expect the DOC to do this on its own as the issues raised have wider implications and impact as wide as the Department of Trade and Industry and the Department of Health."
He said that, considering the next PIAC meeting in September will be the last one with the current government, there was a need to find a way to hand over the work that was done by PIAC and ensure continuity.
"We need to carry over what has already been done and follow it up," says Modise.
Over the weekend, PIAC, which is made up of top executives from big multinationals like IBM and Microsoft, expressed its frustration with the fact that it seems to keep making the same recommendations at each meeting with no clear follow-though.
Communications minister Ivy Matsepe-Casaburri acceded that "very often the work done in the [PIAC] council is not followed up".
The PIAC members, on the other hand, want business to be done like it would be in a "very tight-run cooperation", as described by Microsoft International's VP, Ali Faramawy.
(Additional reporting by the South African Press Association.)
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