{"id":481649,"date":"2021-04-08T15:02:58","date_gmt":"2021-04-08T13:02:58","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/?p=481649"},"modified":"2021-04-08T15:02:58","modified_gmt":"2021-04-08T13:02:58","slug":"saps-to-rehire-old-police-officers-as-it-faces-budget-cuts","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/government\/481649\/saps-to-rehire-old-police-officers-as-it-faces-budget-cuts\/","title":{"rendered":"SAPS to &#8216;rehire&#8217; old police officers as it faces budget cuts"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Police minister Bheki Cele says that his department plans to re-enlist trained and skilled officers who have left the South African Police Service (SAPS) honourably to replace officers that have left over the last year.<\/p>\n<p>This was confirmed by the minister in a recent written parliamentary Q&amp;A following in response to questions from the EFF.<\/p>\n<p>Cele said that officers who left the SAPS in the ranks of constable, sergeant and warrant officer have been invited to apply for re-enlistment to &#8216;capacitate&#8217; police stations and specialised units.<\/p>\n<p>He added that the process is at an advanced stage and that it is envisaged that the date of re-enlistment will commence from 1 April 2021.<\/p>\n<p>Cele said that due to the significant reduction in the compensation budget of the SAPS over the medium-term expenditure framework, the number of new police officers to be enlisted to replace lost capacity is still to be determined.<\/p>\n<p>Data from the internal administration system of the SAPS shows that of 15 March 2021, a total of 5,128 officers left the police service over the previous financial year.<\/p>\n<p>The main reason for leaving the service was resignation (1,733) and retirement with pension (1,009). 719 members of the service passed away, while 343 members were dismissed.<\/p>\n<p><a  data-lightbox=\"post-image\" href=\"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/04\/SAPS.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-481663 aligncenter\" src=\"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/04\/SAPS.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"604\" height=\"281\" srcset=\"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/04\/SAPS.jpg 604w, https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/04\/SAPS-300x140.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 604px) 100vw, 604px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>The SAPS&#8217; latest annual report published in November 2020 shows that the police service has a total of 187,358 employees, a decrease of nearly 5,000 employees from 192,277 in the 2019 report.<\/p>\n<p>This figure includes both active police officers, and administrative staff:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>23,456 commissioned officers;<\/li>\n<li>122,730 non-commissioned officers;<\/li>\n<li>40,288 Public Service Act employees.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>It gives the county a ratio of 1 police officer to 407 people in the country, which is far removed from the international standard of 1 to 220.<\/p>\n<p>SAPS employees work across a range of sectors including \u2018administration\u2019, \u2018visible policing\u2019 and \u2018crime intelligence\u2019, with salaries averaging at\u00a0<strong>R250,000<\/strong>\u00a0for the lowest skills level (1-2).<\/p>\n<p>This rises to an average salary of\u00a0<strong>R1,403,000<\/strong>\u00a0for senior management and executive employees (levels 13-16), while the average salary across all levels is\u00a0<strong>R408,000.<\/strong><\/p>\n<hr \/>\n<p><strong>Read: <a href=\"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/government\/481485\/south-africa-has-a-shortage-of-over-24000-teachers\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">South Africa has a shortage of over 24,000 teachers<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Police minister Bheki Cele says that his department plans to re-enlist trained and skilled officers who have left the South African Police Service (SAPS) honourably to replace officers that have left over the last year.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":386897,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[26],"class_list":["post-481649","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-government","tag-headline"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/481649","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/10"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=481649"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/481649\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":481835,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/481649\/revisions\/481835"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/386897"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=481649"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=481649"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=481649"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}