City plan to force extra rate hike to fund metro police

and any positions that were filled without an approved organogram “would constitute irregular expenditure”.

The municipality appointed metro police chief Pinkie Mathabathe in February without an approved organogram.

Last month, deputy mayor Chippa Ngcolomba asked municipal bosses to clear up any administrative bungles and legalise her appointment.

Yesterday, he lashed out at officials, saying the financial comments showed that some of them were against the establishment of the metro police.

“We have a problem with this document. It makes us suspect that the rejection of the metro police is alive.”

He said the item appeared to be aimed at trying to “hit hard at the governing party”.

“It’s very disappointing and talks to the commitment of officials. Officials’ jobs are to ensure that the governing party’s plans find expression and are implemented.

“Once officials are employed they must act professionally ... I take exception to that [financial comments] and I am highly disappointed.

“We need to take a step back for the officials to really deal with this matter properly and then present it to us, so that it can reflect the will of the governing party,” Ngcolomba said.

Although municipal and political bosses insisted previously that the metro police force would not bring additional costs as the traffic and safety and security budgets would be amalgamated, the council report showed that the municipality needed hundreds of millions of rands in additional funds.

The proposed amounts to be funded from property rates in the 2015-16 financial year will be R247.8-million, increasing to R268.7-million the following year.

Most of the money is needed for staff- related costs. As it cannot rely on income from traffic fines because the “fines income performance has been erratic”, the city says it has no choice but to get the money through additional property rates hikes.

Meanwhile, the municipality’s computer system to capture traffic fines electronically has not been operational for the past six weeks.

Two tenders were put out over the past two weeks for a company to provide a new system. The closing date for tenders is today.

This means traffic fines cannot be loaded electronically and motorists have not been sent electronic fines, which could see the already massive R140-million in outstanding traffic fines pushed up even further.

Safety and security’s acting director Shane Brown said the fines were still being captured manually and would be loaded on to the system once a new company had been awarded the tender.

“Fines will still follow the due processes to be captured online.

“We can only take action and get people to actually pay their fines once a warrant of arrest has been issued. But, otherwise, we have to rely on the public to pay their fines,” Brown said.