Over 7 700 police vehicles not in use for reasons ranging from waiting for repairs and service to damages from accidents – a fact which appears to not have overly much dented the availability of the entire SA Police Service (SAPS) fleet.
According to Police Minister Senzo Mchunu, availability stood at 83.5% as of 27 August 2024. He revealed this when answering a parliamentary question posed by Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) National Council of Provinces (NCOP) Member of Parliament (MP) Nolubabalo Mcinga.
His response to her question did not include the total number of vehicles or types in service and said explaining a breakdown as requested by Mcinga could compromise the safety of a particular police station.
The North West province – where 340 vehicles were unserviceable/unusable when the question was answered – had the lowest out of action number of vehicles, followed by Mpumalanga on 365 and Limpopo on 387.
At the other end of the scale KwaZulu-Natal was streets ahead with 1 511 vehicles out of action. Next up on the list, as supplied by Mchunu, was Gauteng (1 361) followed by the Eastern Cape (1 215) with SAPS head office accounting for 954 unusable vehicles.
As to how long each vehicle will not be available, Mchunu said, without specifying, accidents were 30 days, followed by damages (15 days), repairs (five days) and services (one day).
