By OBAKENG MAJE
Some of concerned residents across the province said they are afraid that the North West Department of Health might privatise the ambulance services tender. This comes after the department continues to outsource the services of private-owned ambulances.
One resident who refused to be named for fear of reprisal said: “It is not a national policy to outsource ambulance services. We expect the department to run them on its own, owing to the past experience. Remember, there was a controversy surrounding the Buthelezi EMS tender.
“Now, the department is allegedly planning to privatise ambulance services. We have seen Maponya EMS criss-cross the province recently and we suspect there might be another controversial tender on the card.”
Another resident said they experienced widespread complaints of poor service from Buthelezi EMS – a company that is currently the subject of both the Hawks and National Treasury investigations. He also said the investigation on a controversial contract the North West Department of Health allegedly entered into with Mediosa is underway.
According to a highly-placed source within the department, who refused to be named for fear of reprisal, alleged that some officials opted to outsource the private ambulance services, so that they can get their ‘cut from the pie’.
However, the North West Health spokesperson, Tebogo Lekgethwane said, the department has opted to make use of private-owned ambulances due to lack of enough ambulances. Lekgethwane said the department has always maintained that the current ambulances procurement and maintenance model does not allow it to always have enough ambulances.
“Even though the department procures ambulances on a yearly basis, they get quickly worn out due to bad roads, while others spend more time in garages being serviced.
“Now, the department is in the process of finalising a full maintenance lease contract, which will work through leasing of ambulances and ensuring more availability and quicker response time,” he said.
Lekgethwane further said the department does use the services of private Emergency Medical Service (EMS) providers per call arrangement, when there is a shortage of ambulances. He added that, there is no contractual agreement with Maponya EMS, and they utilise all private EMS service providers when there are no ambulances available.
“We rotate ambulances between different service providers. So, there is no specific contract, but the department is in the middle of a Supply Chain Management (SCM) process to increase the number of ambulances.
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