RUSTENBURG HERALD - RUSTENBURG - The exorbitant salaries of politicians and people working in national, provincial or local government, is often a topic of hot discussion.
It is indeed interesting to take a look at how lucrative a career in politics seems to be - especially in the times we are living in. In the Government Gazette No.41419 dated 21 October 2024, Frans Rootman discloses the upper limits of Councillor remuneration from 1 July 2024.
According to said Gazette, the Executive Mayor of RLM may receive an annual salary of R1 585 052, plus a cell phone allowance of R3 600/month and a data allowance of R317/month. In addition, the municipality must take out special risk insurance cover to a maximum of R1.5 million on her house and R750 000 on her private vehicle. The life and disability cover is limited to R3 170 104, being two times the total annual remuneration package.
The Speaker may be paid an annual salary of R1 280 117, members of the Mayoral Committee R1 205 851 and Chairpersons of Section 79 Committees, like MPAC, R1 170 478 plus the allowances and fringe benefits. All the other part-time Councillors may receive an annual salary of R593 610, calculated as R49 467/month, over and above the allowances and risk cover disclosed above. It implies, excluding the costs linked to the special risk cover and life and disability cover, in the Gazette that the upper limit for part-time Councillors is R53 384.50 from 1 July 2024. When disclosing the above to the Rustenburg Herald, Rootman mentioned that he wondered how many employees in the area of jurisdiction of RLM receives this type of salary. The big question according to Rootman is: Can the people of Rustenburg afford to pay these salaries to Councillors, as Councillors have always opted in the past to pay themselves the upper limits? Rootman expressed his view that the people of Rustenburg cannot afford to pay these salaries, most definitely not when measured against the performance on service delivery and collection of outstanding debt. Rootman reiterated his long standing accusation against RLM: RLM practices unfair selective credit control and debt collection.
