A government entity managing the SA's road traffic says it's on the brink of bankruptcy as chaotic supercop unit sends costs spiralling.
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A government entity managing the country’s road traffic is running into financial ruin because of a fallout with the SA National Roads Agency Limited (Sanral) over the R4.7 million monthly salary bill of a specialised national traffic policing unit.
The National Traffic Police Intervention Unit, set up by the Road Traffic Management Corporation (RTMC) last year, was mooted to be an overarching supercop unit without a particular jurisdiction.
It is the same unit that is supposed to monitor the tolled roads across Gauteng.
But 17 months since it started, it has only one office in Gauteng and two breathalysers - and its number plate recognition software is defunct.
And now Sanral, which paid for its vehicles and equipment, and had been paying its 260 officers’ R4.7m monthly salary bill since the launch of the unit in March last year, has reneged.
Sources in the corporation told The Sunday Independent this week that the agency had stopped paying for the police unit in October and since then the corporation had had to fork out for it.
The Sunday Independent has seen a copy of an invoice addressed to Sanral, requesting R4.7m in salary payments for the officers.
In a brief statement this week, Sanral’s PR agency, Magna Carta, said: “On a monthly basis, Sanral is making vehicles, fitted with enforcement equipment, available to the RTMC.
“The purpose of the vehicles is traffic law enforcement on the national road network and to increase visible policing on the roads. The staff operating these vehicles are not Sanral employees.”
The corporation, which has been operating for seven years, is responsible for all aspects of road traffic management across SA. It receives an R86m government grant.
Earlier this year, acting chief executive Collins Letsoalo told the National Assembly’s transport committee that the corporation was “effectively insolvent” after the National Treasury turned down a request for additional funding.
The corporation had hired auditing firm Deloitte to clean up its books – despite already employing a fully staffed financial management team - at a cost of R13.3m.
It found that the previous management bought an accident reporting system for R85m, installed an IT help desk for R9m, a payroll system for R34m and entered into a R658m, 10-year property lease - dwarfing its annual budget of R78m.
Now the intervention unit’s salary bill will add to its woes.
The Sunday Independent has also seen copies of the minutes of salary negotiations in which staffer Macema Maluleke, representing the RTMC in the meeting, said the officers needed to “understand” that the position of the RTMC was informed by its current financial situation.
He indicated that for this financial year, the corporation was “allocated around R86m by the Treasury and the corporation’s salary bill per annum is more than R120m excluding projects and operational costs”.
The minutes stated: “He indicated that the corporation gets financial assistance from Sanral and at the moment the corporation is not getting anything from Sanral.”
Intervention unit officers were given 24 Ford Everest 4x4s using sophisticated number plate recognition software that cost R1m to install in each vehicle.
But currently the unit uses only eight of the vehicles.
And officers, who did not wish to be named as they feared victimisation, say they have not received overtime pay since they started.
And since they received their first uniforms last March, they have not received any back-up kits.
“Those uniforms are tacky and falling apart,” said a source.
National Traffic Police chief
David Tembe referred media queries to a corporation spokesman, who could not be reached before going to press.
RTMC spokesman Ashref Ismail denied that it was on the brink of financial collapse - but admitted that the corporation was paying out officers’ salaries.
Ismail would not comment on why Sanral no longer wanted to pay the officers’ salary bill.
He said the corporation had consulted with the Department of Transport, its portfolio committee, the standing committee on public accounts and the Treasury about their financial challenges.
He said that since October, the corporation had raked in R600 000 in fines.
Ismail conceded that the number plate recognition software was not activated, but said they had asked Sanral to activate it.
The corporation was awaiting the purchase of mobile speed cameras, but its primary purpose was not for speed but for intervention.
He conceded that there was a shortage of vehicles, but disputed that there were only two breathalysers, saying there were 18 screening devices.
He said the vehicles were not for high-speed chases but deployed for alcohol enforcement, drag racing and public passenger transport. - Sunday Independent
candice.bailey@inl.co.za