MBOMBELA – The Department of Health needs to work with organised labour to address the outstanding benefits owed to employees.
This is according to Mr Eric Kholwane, MEC for finance and the curator of the health department. He was speaking during an oral answering session in legislature on Friday and responded to questions posed by Ms Jane Sithole, DA MPL.
The department was placed under his curatorship about two months ago. Last week Kholwane said the blatant disregard of policies and regulations had come at a huge cost to health, of which the accrued accounts kept increasing. He said his investigation into its finances showed that certain accruals in the department, such as employee benefits, date back as far as the 2007/08 financial year. He said it stood at R817 million at the moment. He said the accrued compensation payments risked depleting the funds earmarked for service delivery.
“The question is, can we fund salaries until March 2015 (the end of the current financial year)? I am confident that we would be able to carry our obligations. We need to engage organised labour on the matter. From where we are we may not be able to pay for accruals and maintain service delivery.”
According to Kholwane, accrued compensation for staff stood at R252 million, while an additional R114 million was owed on appointments in positions for which the necessary funding did not exist. At the same time, critical positions needed to be filled.
“Funds must be reprioritised. We must tread carefully and make informed decisions. We must engage organised labour to agree on how to address accruals.”
The MEC added that officials who had been found to have done something wrong, had been suspended. “Everyone found on the wrong side of the law will be held accountable.”
