Durban — The financial plight of the South African Post Office (Sapo) and the SABC were exposed in their annual reports for 2022.
Both are state-owned enterprises (SOEs) that have been bleeding taxpayers’ money. Sapo reported a net loss for the period under review of R2.2 billion despite a revenue increase of R6 million. The operational reports stated there was a mail delivery performance improvement from 52.95% to 68.36%.
KwaZulu-Natal has 179 retail outlets, 69 retail agencies, five mail centres, 49 delivery depots, a warehouse and a vehicle fleet of 52.
Consolidating and merging urban non-performing branches with betterperforming outlets saw the closure of 146 branches nationwide of which 55 were amalgamated. The logistics fleet was reduced from 1 236 to 366 vehicles, requiring a national line haul to run on 18 routes.
In human resources, permanent staff were reduced from 1 5826 to 14 460. Despite this 7.2 million Sassa beneficiaries were paid monthly; 15.2 million beneficiaries received Social Relief of Distress grants and 362 465 qualifying needy households registered for the Digital Terrestrial Television subsidised programme.
Seventeen Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) were set but performance for 2021/22 has been poor with only three KPIs achieved.
Sapo chief executive officer Nomkhita Mona said they had been severely impacted by the Covid-19 lockdown, associated business slowdown and the increased rate of digital migration. Suppliers were not paid and had withdrawn services, further impacting revenue generation.
Only 256 of the target of 1 680 installations of cash protection devices were achieved due to the service provider suspending deployment due to payment challenges.
Since the start of the payment of social grants, crime levels for armed robberies at branches, CIT, vehicle hijacking and business burglaries have increased to unprecedented levels. During 2021/22, a total of 3 437 crime incidents were reported with a total reported loss value of R105.2m.
As of March 31, 2022 creditors, including accruals, amount to R4.4bn and include a salary debt of R150m for the period April 2020 to February 2021. Fruitless and wasteful expenditure during 201/22 amounted to R648.2m.
The SABC report revealed that the national broadcaster incurred R2.8bn in irregular, fruitless and wasteful expenditure, with a net loss of R201m.
It also revealed a number of lawsuits against them. The SABC board’s five-year term ends on October 15.
Group chief executive officer Madoda Mxakwe said the year ended with the SABC having implemented 96% of the key actions in the SABC Turnaround Plan that were within its control.
Mxakwe said in response to the revenue performance, expenditure was prudently managed to result in a 62% reduction in the loss incurred compared to last year.
During the 2021/2022 year, 671 vacancies were advertised and 414 appointments were made. In the period under review, 1.9 million (2021: 2.2 million) licence holders managed to settle their television licence fees in full or in part against a known database of 10.5 million (2021: 10.3 million) television licence holders. The licence fee collection rates indicate an evasion rate of 81.7% (2021: 82.1%).
DA Shadow Minister of Communications, MP Dianne Kohler Barnard, said the failings of SOEs had become endemic to South Africa. She said these reports were for two imploding entities and revealed how mismanagement and corruption were costing South Africans “an absolute fortune”.
“It is truly shocking to see the staggering amount of money that the public has paid over the years for SOEs which continue to fail year after year.
“The SABC is another sinking ship. Soon the Post Office and SABC will be holding out begging bowls for further massive taxpayer-funded bailouts,” she said.
Daily News