Nosiviwe Mapisa-Nqakula laments ‘inadequate’ defence budget
The defence minister had tried to have the budget increased, but it was reduced, resulting in a shortfall in the allocation for employees’ wages
Defence Minister Nosiviwe Mapisa-Nqakula bemoaned the inadequate budgetary allocation of R47.9bn for defence in her budget vote speech in Parliament on Friday. Attempts by the minister to have the budget increased were not successful. She wanted the baseline for defence over the medium-term expenditure framework (MTEF) to be raised by R18.2bn so that the Defence Review could be implemented. Instead there has been a reduction of R5.8bn in this year’s budget, with the result that there is a R3.2bn shortfall in the allocation for compensation of employees. "The reduction translates to an R18bn reduction over the MTEF. This poses serious constraints to defence and the plan to arrest the defence decline remains unfunded," Mapisa-Nqakula said. She said it seemed likely that the downward funding trajectory would continue for the foreseeable future. Should this be the case, urgent steps would have to be taken to stabilise the department and create a more sustainable defence capability, albe...
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