The lives of Gauteng residents are at great risk with the Department of Community Safety sitting with a large number of about 236 vacancies, with inadequate human resources to render services to ensure their safety.
Most of these vacancies typically occur due to retirement, leaving the department with an institutional knowledge and expertise vacuum as these positions are not pro-actively filled.
The Gauteng Community Safety MEC, Faith Mazibuko said there is a shortage of students and officers to fill the vacancies due to the Covid-19 pandemic as colleges were closed. Therefore, they are not able to fill these vacancies adequately.
MEC Mazibuko was responding to my questions during the Community Safety’s Portfolio Committee meeting this past Thursday.
What is especially concerning is that the department system automatically locks out the employee at the beginning of the month where they turn 60, and with insufficient human resources to act during crisis times such as the recent incidents of looting and violence, either these employees are not reinstated or their position is not filled.
This is a clear indication of the department’s incompetency and incapacitation to operate, especially during a time of a security crisis.
According to the department’s fourth quarterly report for the 2020/21 financial year, the department had a total of 236 vacant posts.
This is unacceptable considering that several unemployed graduates in our province possess the needed skills and qualifications, yet the department has not yet filled those vacancies. So many young South Africans remain locked out of employment, especially during the pandemic. This Department has the power to empower some of these South Africans and profoundly improve their lives by giving them a sustainable livelihood.
The DA demands that the department avoid such a mess again, by ensuring that any large number of vacant posts are filled pro-actively, by planning as to how many people will retire within the following quarter, so that residents of Gauteng can have the safety services they pay for.
The DA will continue to put pressure on MEC Mazibuko to ensure that these vacant posts are filled as a matter of urgency. We will also be tabling written questions to the MEC to ascertain the exact number of vacant posts and positions. We will also ascertain what happened to the graduate programme where the department was utilising the services of law graduate to help with dockets. This programme is needed now more than ever to help police process the many cases of social unrest, looting and violence in the province. Gauteng residents deserve a Community Safety Department that is adequately resourced to be able to conduct proper oversight of the SAPS and support them in rendering quality services to the people.