SAICE highlights the impact of corruption on infrastructure during Global Ethics Month

With October being Global Ethics Month, the South African Institution of Civil Engineering (SAICE) has highlighted the ongoing threat that corruption poses to the country’s infrastructure delivery, public trust, and professional integrity.

South Africa scored 41 points out of 100 on the 2024 Corruption Perceptions Index, reflecting a sector struggling with unethical procurement, favouritism, and the intimidation of whistleblowers. These challenges, SAICE warns, directly affect whether communities receive safe and sustainable infrastructure or are left facing systemic failure.

“Beyond the financial and technical implications, corruption also damages the moral fabric of our profession, discouraging ethical engineers who strive to uphold their duty to the public. At SAICE, we continue to advocate for integrity-driven leadership within both the public and private sectors to restore confidence in infrastructure delivery,” said Sekadi Phayane-Shakhane, CEO of SAICE.

The institution emphasises that unethical procurement inflates project costs, compromises safety, and wastes public funds. In the public sector, it leads to misallocation of funds for critical infrastructure such as roads, water systems, and housing. In the private sector, it distorts fair competition and erodes market integrity.

“Corruption forces professionals into untenable ethical dilemmas, choosing between doing the right thing and keeping their livelihoods and creates an environment of moral fatigue and fear,” said Takalani Netshipale, SAICE Ethics Panel Chairperson.

According to SAICE, reputational damage is also significant. When the public loses confidence in the engineering profession’s ability to deliver transparently and competently, the sector suffers. The organisation continues to champion ethical procurement standards and encourages members to prioritise long-term value and societal impact over short-term gain.

From a technical standpoint, awarding contracts based on favouritism or bribery rather than competence leads to substandard work, endangering lives and increasing maintenance costs. SAICE notes that intimidation, whether coercion to approve non-compliant work, threats from contractors or clients, or isolation within organisations, remains one of the biggest barriers to ethical accountability. Professionals who report wrongdoing often face retaliation, including exclusion from future projects, professional defamation, and even threats to personal safety.

“At SAICE, we are deeply committed to breaking this cycle of intimidation and fear of whistleblowers. We advocate for environments where ethical professionals are celebrated, not punished, for their courage. Our Ethics Committee ensures that members have a safe and confidential space and that they understand their rights and available reporting channels,” Netshipale added.

SAICE stresses that transparency is central to professional integrity. Its Code of Ethics sets out clear expectations for honesty, fairness, and accountability in all engineering practice. The institution promotes ethical conduct through workshops, campaigns, and public engagements, equipping engineers to make transparent and responsible decisions.

“At SAICE, we also play an advocacy role, working alongside regulators and industry leaders to promote open tendering systems, clear audit trails, and ethical oversight mechanisms in infrastructure projects. These are vital to building a culture of trust that sustains the civil engineering profession,” Phayane-Shakhane said.

The institution also encourages engineers to embed ethics in daily practice. “We believe transparency starts at an individual level. Through our ethics dialogues, mentoring programmes, and the SAICE Ethics Imbizo, our engineers are encouraged to adopt proactive transparency practices, communicate openly, and disclose potential conflicts of interest. These behaviours, when multiplied across the sector, can meaningfully reduce opportunities for corruption to take root,” Phayane-Shakhane confirmed.

Fair and transparent procurement, SAICE notes, is essential for ethical infrastructure delivery. The organisation continues to work with government and industry to ensure procurement prioritises quality, competence, and ethics over cost alone.

“This Global Ethics Day (observed on October 16), we recognise our role at SAICE is to ensure that engineers are not passive participants but active stewards of transparency and fairness. We continually emphasise that procurement decisions must be guided by the public interest, not private gain,” concluded Phayane-Shakhane.