Committee disappointed by poor support for military veterans
The Select Committee on Security and Justice has today expressed grave concerns with the poor support being provided to military veterans and has resolved to call the minister to account for what it called a “failure” by the department to execute its mandate.
“The department’s inability to provide adequate services and the support it has been established to offer to military veterans cannot be tolerated – and as legislators we need responses from the executive authority in this regard,” said Committee Chairperson, Kgoshi Setlamorago Thobejane.
The Committee expressed its discontentment today’s meeting with the Department of Military Veterans in Mpumalanga, after learning that the department only managed to build a disappointing number of 41 houses against a target of 3 000 houses it had intended to build in the 2015/16 financial year.
The department was led by its Deputy Director-General, Dr Alex Mahapa.
The Committee also learnt with shock at the revelation that because of this failure to build houses for military veterans, the department had to return about R150m of its R163 million housing allocation to the National Treasury.
According to Kgoshi Thobejane, such underspending in the face of abject poverty is unacceptable and answers on how to prevent this from recurring must be provided by the executive authority.
Details of the meeting with the executive authority of the department will be communicated, once all necessary arrangements have been made.
The Committee will visit some of the houses of the military veterans in Bushbuckridge tomorrow, 1 September 2016.
For media enquiries or interviews with the Committee Chairperson, please contact:
Temba Gubula
Parliamentary Communication Services
Tel: 021 403 8307
Cell: 078 735 8809/ 081 402 3531
Email: tgubula@parliament.gov.za
