THE government spent almost R1 billion in legal fees in the past year defending a number of lawsuits against it.
This is according to a report tabled by the Department of Justice and Correctional Services to MPs last week. In the report, the department told members of the justice and correctional services committee the government faced hundreds of civil claims. In the 2015/16 financial year the state spent more than R700 million in legal fees defending lawsuits against different departments.
The Justice Department would not say how many departments were being sued, but said health and the SAPS were their biggest clients.
It said the two departments were bearing the large costs of litigation, but did not give a breakdown of the amounts spent in legal fees.
The police and health departments have mainly been sued for wrongful arrests and negligence.
In the first quarter of the 2016/17 financial year the Department of Justice and the state spent R211m in legal fees.
It said 389 litigation cases had been finalised in the first quarter. The total amount spent by departments defending lawsuits in 2015/16 and in the first quarter of the current financial year amounted to R920m. The Department of Justice said it wanted to fix the litigation area. “The department has as one of its priorities the turnaround of the state-attorney offices,” said the report. The State finalised a total of 1 566 litigation matters in the courts in the past financial year.