Department’s spending questioned

The Gauteng department of sports, arts, culture and recreation (SACR) spent nearly R500 000 on an event which took place on a video call and over R1 million more on the Human Rights Day campaign in the middle of a pandemic.

This is according to the department’s MEC, Mbali Hlophe, who admitted it in a legislature reply to Democratic Alliance (DA) MPL and sports, arts and culture spokesperson Lebo More.

“As artists and sportspersons languish with no income under lockdown, the opposition party was appalled to find that Hlophe spent R429 985 on a Human Rights Day virtual event and continues to spend millions on virtual programmes while simultaneously failing to provide relief funding to financially struggling Gauteng athletes and artists,” said the DA in a statement.

“The DA in Gauteng notes with great concern that the Gauteng athletes and artists who applied for financial assistance from the Gauteng SACR as part of the relief fund have not yet received these funds.”

The event in question was set to take place at Pelindaba Cemetery and another venue in commemoration of Human Rights Day last year. But according to Hlophe, several items in the programme for the day were cancelled due to Covid-19 and the event was held virtually.

Despite the national mandate to redirect funds towards dealing with Covid-19, the department also forged ahead with a multimedia campaign launch for Human Rights Day, paying more than R1 million to service providers for such services as organising artists to record content for the campaign.

The department paid talent management company Art of Independence R480 000 as the overall service provider for sports practitioners. It also paid R465 000 for 27 artists, including actors, singers and TikTok stars, for recording Human Rights Day messages to be aired on various platforms.

Child performer Prince Mashawana, known as “Supermash”, was paid R493 000 to take part in the campaign launch and Newzroom Afrika was appointed for the broadcast.

The DA called on premier David Makhura to initiate an urgent investigation into the delays in the processing of relief funds.

In October last year, the department sent SMSes to all Gauteng Relief Fund applicants, apologising to the applicants for the delays in processing their applications.

The message also stated that the relief funding, which was supposed to be released on 30 September, 2020, would be released after 30 October, 2020.