The Charlotte Maxeke Johannesburg Hospital has made slow progress in providing parking to replace what was destroyed in the fire 18 months ago, with a shortage of more than 1000 parking spaces.
According to a written reply by Gauteng Health MEC Nomantu Nkomo-Ralehoko to my questions in the Gauteng Legislature, the hospital used to have 1700 on-site parking bays, but now has only 229 bays in the hospital and 400 nearby.
This means there are 1071 fewer parking bays than previously.
Alternative parking is provided at the Nelson Mandela Children’s Hospital (140 bays), 120 at the Johannesburg College, 80 at the hospital residence, and 60 at the Wits Web Help Building.
I have proposed that the hospital use the parking at the province-owned Emoyeni Conference Centre which is opposite the hospital. Nkomo-Ralehoko says that the hospital requested parking at Emoyeni from the Department of Infrastructure Development (DID) in October 2021, but was informed
that the parking bays are not accessible as it was privately leased.
Confusingly, she says that her department “will approach the Department of Land Affairs through National Department of Health to negotiate the use of parking at Emoyeni.”
An extra 300 rebuilt parking bays are supposed to be available on 6 November this year, and the hospital has approached Wits University and KPMG for more off-site parking using shuttle services.
Meanwhile, hundreds of staff and patients are frustrated every day as they hunt for parking and walk long distances to get to the hospital.
It shows the poor leadership of CMJH CEO Gladys Bogoshi who should have pushed far earlier for solutions to alleviate this parking crisis.
For instance, why are they only now approaching the Department of Land Affairs in order to use the Emoyeni parking?
The DA proposes that hospital CEOs be appointed using rigorous criteria to ensure that only tiptop people are chosen who get things done, instead of weak CEOs chosen for political reasons.