Cape Town - The Public Service Commission (PSC) on Thursday expressed concern about the high number of senior management staff who failed to disclose their financial interests in the past year.
Overall, national and provincial departments' compliance rate with the financial disclosure framework stood at 84% for 2012/13.
The PSC said of the 5 425 senior management officials at national government departments, only 81% submitted financial disclosure forms. At provincial departments, the figure stood at 88%.
"There is a reluctance on the part of certain SMS (senior management services) members to declare their registrable interests as required by the framework.
"To this end, a total of 1 495 financial disclosure forms are outstanding," the PSC said, noting the figure included officials who have been suspended.
It was concerned that ethics officers had failed to take action against officials who failed to comply with the regulations.
Only three provinces - Mpumalanga, Northern Cape and Western Cape - registered full compliance with the framework by the reporting date of May 31, 2013.
"Despite significant improvement in the submission rate by the due date in the current reporting period, there are some of the departments, both at national and provincial level, that did not submit a single financial disclosure form to the PSC by the due date," the commission said.
"This has drastically affected the overall submission rate that has been recorded nationally."
The PSC could not immediately provide the submission rate for the previous financial year.