The police’s chief financial officer, Lt-Gen Puleng Dimpane, has revealed that the political killings task team (PKTT) has spent R435m since its inception in 2018.
She told parliament’s ad hoc committee investigating allegations of criminal infiltration, corruption and political interference in the justice system on Tuesday that the bulk of the money went to paying for overtime, travel and accommodation.
Dimpane said she has had conversations with national police commissioner Gen Fannie Masemola regarding making the PKTT a permanent structure in order to budget for it properly.
“...with the PKTT, we have noted that it is clearly dealing with something that is permanent. For us, from a budgeting point of view, it becomes challenging when you receive applications almost every three months for five years.
“You are unable to budget properly; you are unable to project properly. It may be necessary for this to become a permanent structure to deal with the permanent problem [political killings] that seemingly exists,” she said.
“It was my understanding that this particular team was established to deal with the problems in KwaZulu-Natal. I even made suggestions to say, ‘Let us ask the organisational development [arm of the police] to put together a permanent structure, and we give this structure to [Lt] General [Nhlanhla] Mkhwanazi in KwaZulu-Natal to deal with this permanent problem, because for five years we can’t continue like this from a budgeting point of view’.”
She said if the task team were permanent, the police would be able to budget for it properly.
Dimpane said Operation Vala Umgodi — which was established to tackle illegal mining activities — has spent R1.1bn over three years.
“This particular intervention [Operation Vala Umgodi] only started in the 2023/24 [financial year] and we have expenditure up to end of September 2025/26. You will note that the expenditure to date for three years is over a billion,” she said.
This particular intervention [Operation Vala Umgodi] only started in the 2023/24 [financial year] and we have expenditure up to end of September 2025/26.
— Puleng Dimpane, police’s chief financial officer
Dimpane said Operation Vala Umgodi was not funded from the police’s budget but through the Criminal Assets Recovery Account (Cara).
“It is funding that does not come from our baseline. We are given an opportunity as the law enforcement agencies to, from time to time, approach the Cara funding committee to request funding.
“The Cara ... funding is used to assist [police] departments. From time to time, the accounting officer, having assessed the financial and alternative financial sources, would approach the Cara committee.”
Dimpane said the police spent R950m on a task team to deal with the July 2021 unrest, as the situation could not be contained using normal provincial resources.
Sowetan
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