Gauteng 'will spend full health budget'

Johannesburg - The Gauteng health and social development department is confident it will spend its allocated infrastructure budget, said spokesperson Simon Zwane.

He was reacting to a claim by the Democratic Alliance on Monday that about R83m of the budget would go unspent.

The department had already spent R44m on infrastructure, Zwane said in a statement later on Monday.

"This amount has been spent on equipment for all hospitals, upgrading of nursing homes and general maintenance work at public health facilities," he said.

Zwane said the department was also procuring equipment for the Germiston hospital, which would soon be officially opened.

He said the infrastructure budget had been reprioritised.

In his statement, DA MPL Mike Moriarty said the R83m figure, which covered the period from July to September, was contained in the Gauteng government's recently tabled second quarterly report.

He said the National Treasury had allocated R143m for badly-needed repairs to Gauteng public hospitals, but that only R26m (18%) of it had been spent after six months.

Spending in the first quarter was only 9%, at which stage assurances had been given that it was a project management issue and that capacity was being added, Moriarty said.

"At this rate, the department will have underspent by two-thirds of its entire budget by the end of the financial year," he said.