Durban: While South Africans will enter the new year grappling with the rising cost of living, stagnant salaries and poor service delivery, approximately R239 million has been allocated to President Cyril Ramaphosa’s new ministers and deputies for the 2025/2026 financial year.
This is according to a parliamentary response to a question asked by ActionSA. The allocation has been confirmed for salaries, support staff, official vehicles and other services. Opposition political parties have questioned the exorbitant amount arguing that the size of the Cabinet should be reduced, and more money should be allocated to address the challenges facing citizens.
Alan Beesley, ActionSA MP, posed the question asking for the total costs for all new ministries and deputy ministers. In the response, the government said that the total allocation amounts to R239 million in the 2025/26 financial year, with carry-through costs over the 2025 Medium-Term Expenditure Framework.
“The allocation is for salaries of the executive, cost of support staff, official vehicles, and goods and services.”
Beesley said that it is totally unacceptable that the expanded cabinet is costing an additional R239m per annum.
“Our country is facing huge fiscal constraints. We have children going hungry, we have police without police vehicles, we have schools with pit latrine toilets, and as such, the additional (allocation) is outrageous. The entire Cabinet should hang their heads in shame.”
Steve Swart, African Christian Democratic Party MP, said they were concerned about the cost.
“The government is facing severe financial constraints, which have resulted in budget cuts across all departments, severely impacting our teachers, policemen, healthcare workers, soldiers, and other public servants. It is clear that the country cannot afford such a bloated Cabinet.”
Swart added that they believed that government departments should be restructured to ensure efficiency and better service delivery.
Zama Ntshona, spokesperson for the African Transformation Movement (ATM), told SABC news that the current Cabinet was a result of mismanagement and excessive spending.
“We can’t accept this as South Africans, that over R1 billion will be spent on ministers and deputies over the next five years, especially when so many basic services are not being carried out. It’s time for President Ramaphosa to seriously consider a reduction in the size of the Cabinet.”
MK Party head of programmes Musa Mkhize said that the majority of South Africans go to bed without food.
“It’s important to skill young people to be able to meet the job market. This will reduce crime and social ills. The cost of adding new ministers and deputies to the Government of National Unity (GNU) is too much, and the issue is who is benefiting from this bloated Cabinet. It’s only the GNU ministers and deputies that are benefiting from this while the most impoverished continue to suffer in South Africa.”
Zakhele Ndlovu, politics lecturer at the University of KwaZulu-Natal (UKZN), said: “What makes it worse is that our executive branch of government is bloated. The size of the executive is disproportionate to the needs of the population, with multiple departments duplicating efforts. This amounts to robbery.”