Africa-Press – South-Africa. Cape Town – Parliament heard on Tuesday that the budget of the SAPS has been cut by R11.8 billion to R96.3bn in the 2021/22 financial year.
During the meeting of the police portfolio committee, MPs heard that no additional funding was made available as a result of Covid-19 and that there were substantial budget reductions.
Briefing the committee on the budget and annual performance plans, chief financial officer Lieutenant General Puleng Dimpane said out of the R108 billion allocation, R11.1 billion was cut from the compensation of employees, R3.8m from departmental agencies and accounts, R673m from goods and services and R45m from claims against the state.
Dimpane also said there was reprioritisation of R85m from compensation for leave payouts on exit of the members.
Her presentation showed that visible policing was the hardest hit by the budget cuts with 7.2% decrease from R53.4 million to R49.5m, followed by crime intelligence 2.1%, protection and security services 1% and detective services 0.7%.
The huge chuck of the overall budget, a total of R75.3bn, went to the compensation of employees, something that did not augur well with parliamentarians.
The compensation of employees constituted 78% of the total budget for the financial year.
Dimpane said R58.7bn was allocated for the salary bill with R200m for overtime during the municipal elections to be held later this year.
She told MPs that the spending focus would be on goods and services as well as capital investment over the medium term.
Dimpane stated that with reduction in the compensation of employees budget, this would require SAPS resource allocation reprioritisation and an investment in technology.
She, however, said gender-based violence would remain a focus and additional emphasis on family violence, child protection and sexual offences unit by allocating R1.272 billion for proactive and reactive response to these crimes.
Dimpane also said they would invest in capital assets consisting of machinery and equipment essentially transportation assets as well as mobile police stations.
There would also be a focus on other critical items such as bullet-resistant vests, firearms, uniform as well as building capacity of the Public Order Policing Unit and interventions through deployments.
Political Bureau
