Africa-Press – South-Africa. Gauteng premier Panyaza Lesufi says the lifestyle audit of health department head Lesiba Malotana is still outstanding and he will decide his future as soon as it is finalised.
“I act on evidence. The evidence I have now is insufficient and the institution conducting lifestyle audits has requested an extension and I’ve granted that extension. When they conclude that report I’ll be in a position to take action.”
Gauteng MPLs engaged MECs during question time at a sitting in Selbourn Hall, Johannesburg, on Tuesday.
On Sunday, Lesufi reshuffled and removed several heads of department after a damning report that revealed about R1.8bn in underspending, including missed service delivery performance targets.
He said some department heads had missed their performance targets.
Lesufi also told MPLs the provincial government is on track with its E-tolls debt repayment plan.
“We are on track. We don’t owe the national government. We owe the South African National Roads Agency. So far we’ve [paid] three instalments. We remain with two instalments and we’ll ensure the history of E-tolls in our country is buried once and for all.”
Asked about filling teachers vacancies, education MEC Matome Chiloane said the department has estimated an amount of about R678m for the filling of growth posts.
The department has earmarked 1,500 growth posts for the 2025/2026 financial year due to budgetary constraints.
“The department has not injected any new posts into the system, besides growth posts to address admission pressure. Other vacant posts due to attrition will be filled in line with the profile compiled by schools to meet their operational needs.”
Chiloane said 11 of the earmarked 1,500 posts are allocated to special schools and filling such posts will be done in line with recruitment, considering the profile needs of each school.
The department, through its employee health and wellness programme, continues to prioritise the psychosocial wellbeing of educators as a critical component of a safe and supportive teaching environment.
Asked about the challenges in the admissions of grade 1 and 8 pupils, which include concerns about delays, digital access challenges and capacity constraints, he said what is perceived as delayed placement is parents’ refusal to accept offers or allocated placements.
“Such parents demand placement in schools of choice where capacity would have been reached. Procedures are put in place to address that. School capacities were increased to accommodate additional learners in high pressure schools where land space is available on the premises, school resources are being supplemented with self-built classrooms and mobile units [and] advocacy is amplified to reiterate the regulated admission to manage public expectation.
“The application period for parents to submit applications to schools is from July 24 to August 29. The department encourages parents to adhere to these time frames when applying and submitting supporting documents to schools.”
Additional resources have been made available to assist parents with the application processes at decentralised venues, district offices and public schools and the provincial head office.
Public school districts and the provincial office are available to assist parents to submit their applications during the application period.
Chiloane said the application system was subjected to rigorous testing before it was opened, including functionality tests, performance tests, load, soak and concurrency tests.
No technical issues were experienced in the admission period to date.
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