National Treasury prevented Provincial Community Safety from achieving 100% of targets

31 October 2022

During the review of the Annual Report 2021/22, the Department of Police Oversight and Community Safety informed the Standing Committee that National Treasury’s decision to suspend all government procurement prevented the Department from achieving all of its targets.

This comes after the Minister of Finance, Enoch Godongwana, misread the Constitutional Court’s judgement on the 2017 preferential procurement regulations in which it had set it aside. Despite the Court providing a 12-month window for new regulations to be written, National Treasury chose to suspend procurement immediately.

We thus call on the National Treasury to expedite its efforts before this window lapses in January next year.

As such, it meant that the Department was not able to complete the bid process for contract a service provider to compile a set of policy briefs needed for the Police Needs and Priorities (PNP) report.

The PNP report is an important document that forms part of the Department’s oversight over SAPS.

As per the Western Cape Community Safety Act of 2014, the PNP Report annually details the allocation, distribution and utilisation of policing resources with the aim of providing recommendations to decision makers to improve safety in the province. Thereafter, it is also sent to key role players in the public sector and civil society in order to influence the decisions taken place on a national level. The report provides meaningful insights towards providing effective and sound oversight over policing and safety.

While the Department was still able to obtain 98% of its targets, this decision has delayed the publication of a crucial document for our province – the only kind that is found in our country.

Issued by Gillion Bosman, DA Western Cape Spokesperson on Community Safety, 31 October 2022