By Johnathan Paoli
The ad hoc committee investigating allegations against the South African Police Service (SAPS) resumed its hearings at the Kgosi Mampuru Correctional Centre on Tuesday, with SAPS Chief Financial Officer Lieutenant-General Puleng Dimpane delivering extensive testimony that sharply contrasted with Police Minister Senzo Mchunu’s claims about the financial burden of the Political Killings Task Team (PKTT).
The session began with customary formality as committee chairperson, Soviet Lekganyane, individually greeted each member.
Kgosi Mampuru Area Commissioner Emmanuel Khoza welcomed MPs to the temporary parliamentary precinct, assuring them they were “safe” and free to proceed with their work.
Advocate Lerato Zikalala led Dimpane through her career and role within SAPS.
She explained that the national commissioner functions as the accounting officer, while she oversees the entire SAPS budget, financial statements, compensation, and internal controls.
She stressed that she does not take operational decisions, nor does she award contracts, her role is to approve expenditure where funds are available.
On the PKTT, Dimpane confirmed that the specialised task team was initially funded as a provincial allocation in KwaZulu-Natal when created in 2018, before shifting to the national operations centre.
To date, R435 million has been spent on the PKTT, with overtime, travel, accommodation, and subsistence forming the bulk of its costs, trends she described as typical for non-permanent task teams.
She contrasted the PKTT’s expenditure with those of other major operations: the illicit mining task team has cost more than R1 billion since 2023/24, largely funded through the Criminal Assets Recovery Account (CARA), while the July 2021 unrest response cost R950 million directly from SAPS’s budget.
Because the PKTT increasingly handles permanent work, she said, it may require the stability and clarity of a permanent structure.
“If it was permanent, it would not have the accommodation costs and meals. We needed it to be structured, because it is doing great work,” she said.
A central focus of the committee was whether Minister Mchunu had any factual basis for citing excessive expenditure as motivation to disband the PKTT.
Dimpane flatly contradicted the minister’s public claims.
She told MPs that although she held five budget briefings with Mchunu after his appointment in July, none of them concerned the PKTT.
Asked whether the minister ever requested a cost analysis of the PKTT, or even comparative figures for other task teams; she replied: “No.”
She added that she first learned of the PKTT’s dissolution through media reports while on leave.
The CFO also expressed shock that an internal information note she drafted in March 2024, concerning a R94 million funding request, had been used by Mchunu as evidence.
The note, addressed only to the national commissioner, had been taken “out of context” and wrongly portrayed as indicating she supported disbanding the PKTT.
The committee continues.
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