In-house team
to almost double
Ray Smuts
THE NATIONAL Ports Authority is in the process of rectifying what would seem to be a glaring omission of the past - no security chiefs at South African ports.
Cape Town's port manager Sanjay Govan will not
be alone in feeling much relieved when his new 'eagle eye' assumes office within the next month or so.
Add to that the fact that the entire Port of Cape Town will be security fenced (cost: R6 million) and under camera surveillance (camera cost alone is almost R1,5 million) before the year is out.
Govan, who came to Cape Town from East London less than a year ago to succeed Malcolm Green, readily admits he has been none too happy with the standard of security in the port, poor security being a legacy of the past.
"My understanding is that security has been a problem in this port for years and we have had to deal with a situation where in-house security staff morale was at a low ebb due to an incorrect perception that the department was closing down," Govan told FTW last week.
At one stage the in-house security complement stood at 70. This figure has
been gradually reduced to around 26 so one can
perhaps understand the uncertainty on the part of employees as to their future.
Govan says the intention is to beef up in-house security considerably to around 43 personnel including
a number of new senior appointments, but stresses this will be effected over a three-year period.
First to come will be a security manager and two assistant security managers, the first taking responsibility for NPA operations and the others port users at facilities including the container and multi-purpose terminals.
Falling under the assistant security managers will be four SPOs (senior protection officers) but only one will be phased in before the end of the year, the remainder to follow by 2005.
To foot the bill for
all these the additional requirements, NPA Cape Town has asked head office for an allocation of almost R1,5 million this year, which will increase to some R5 million over three years.
Says Govan: "Because of a lack of senior personnel we have not been able to monitor the effectiveness of the three out-of-house security companies - all of whom have reapplied for new contracts - but one of the new appointees will be charged expressly with carrying out this monitoring function."
It seems likely that the current 12-month contracts will be replaced by 24-month agreements with NPA having the final say whether or not to renew after the initial 12.
