The South African government has adopted an ambitious government-wide monitoring and evaluation system (GWM&ES) headed by a newly established Ministry for Monitoring and Evaluation in the Presidency since 2009. It is supposed to systematically monitor and evaluate the outcomes of government programme performance at all governmental levels. However, South Africa has serious backlogs in infrastructure and services. This paper deals with one such weakness: the absence of policy outcome indicators to measure progress towards a better life for all. The paper assesses the Outcome Service Agreements for basic education, enhanced employment and sustainable human settlements that have been concluded between the President and his Ministers. It concludes that the move from an output to an outcome evaluation focus is still largely conceptual and rhetorical. Appropriate measurable statements (outcomes) and measuring instruments (indicators) in terms of the good practices of outcome-driven evaluation and indicator development are not yet in place. #GovernmentEvaluation #performancemeasurement #InternationalandCross-CulturalEval #2011Conference #Casestudy #SouthAfrica