Hon Speaker, allow me to take this opportunity to pass my sincere condolences to the family of Lance Bomdardier Itumeleng Macdonald Moreo of Dibate village in Mahikeng who is amongst the 14 members of the South African National Defence Force who were killed in Eastern DRC.
We join the cries for many of our people in this country and the rest of the continent to demand that the African Union not relent in the 2063 commitment to silence the guns on our beloved continent.
Hon Members, as we mark the 70th anniversary of the adoption of the Freedom Charter we need to remind ourselves of the objectives we set ourselves in the National Development Plan (NDP):
- To build a more prosperous country that is progressively eradicating poverty and inequality, over time
- To eliminate the effects of apartheid and colonial discrimination that has scarred our society, in order to lay the basis for greater social cohesion, unity and opportunity.
Hon President, the North West is arguably the richest province in South Africa, yet has the highest unemployment rate in the country. Experts and academics call it the “paradox of the plenty”.
Therefore, something drastic needs to be done to the turn the tide against this socio-economic conundrum. Hon President, we welcome the process for the review of the White Paper on Local Government. The North West Executive Council is the first to be consulted and will be submitting our proposals in due course.
It is our wish that this process not be rushed but allow for broad and extensive relook into our governance model and design. This will enable us to learn from the mistakes of local governance since its inception.
The North West Province supports the position adopted by SALGA that the funding model of local government be prioritized and run parallel with the white paper review process. We are also of the view that a broader conversation is needed to include overall public sector funding review which includes equitable funding to provinces.
A holistic funding review process should in our view include in-depth scrutiny of the Division of Revenue Model to determine whether its current form is assisting poor provinces to address the socio-economic needs of the people. The North West is of the firm view that the current equitable share allocation model should be centred on addressing developmental challenges confronting provinces based on their needs and not the population. This should be done without compromising the unitary nature of our fiscal framework.
Hon Speaker, we are however hard at work to improve the functionality and service delivery performance of our local municipalities through the Local Government Turn Around Strategy. We are collaborating with the National Treasury through mandatory interventions to assist municipalities with financial recovery plans, governance and skills audit. There is progress but more still needs to be done to bring the state of local governance in the North West on par with the rest of the country.
Hon Speaker, we have increased the tempo of the province’s Accelerated Service Delivery Programme (Thuntsha Lerole) now Reloaded, to prioritise rural communities. This has given us the chance to strengthen and solidify our relations with our traditional leaders, by prioritising water, sanitation and road infrastructure projects in these communities.
Close to four hundred and fifty million rand (R450m) has been set aside to implement water and sanitation projects in villages such as Bodibe, Ramosadi, Signal Hill, Dinokana and Lobatla among others. A further four hundred and eighty-five million rand has been committed for the construction of a pipeline from the Bloemhof Dam to Mamusa Local Municipality. This project which is due to be completed in June this year will alleviate water provision challenges in Schweizer Reneke and surrounding towns.
In November last year we handed over a ninety-six million rand (R96m) bulk sewer and reticulation plant at Rekgaratlhile near Stella in Naledi Local Municipality. Several more projects of a similar kind are being implemented in various parts of the province.
Hon Speaker, the North West is a province on the move. We have laid the foundation for most of the ambitious plans for the future of the province.
We have recently completed the province’s growth and developmental strategy and it will be implemented in full swing in the 2025/26 financial year. The strategy is beginning to yield desired results in that, in December last year, we opened a newly refurbished R200 million Gold Processing Plant at Orkney in the City of Matlosana Local Municipality. This forms part of a two-billion-rand (R2bn) investment by China Africa Precious Metals which will create four thousand jobs.
Furthermore, we recently met with the newly appointed Group Chief Executive Officer of Harmony Gold, Mr Beyers Nel and his Group Executive on the side-lines of Africa Mining Indaba. The mining company has invested over seven billion rand (R7bn) at its operations in the City of Matlosana Local Municipality preserving over six thousand jobs, extending the lifespan of the mine by more than fifteen years.
Several more investment projects are in the pipeline following the investment conferences we held last year as well as our visit to the Henan province of China and South Korea.
Madam Speaker, agriculture remains an important sector in helping the province drive its developmental agenda. Over thirty-six million rand (R36m) has been set aside to support the Red Meat production programme, targeted at over seven thousand beneficiaries. We are working with Agri-North West to bolster and support mentorship programmes to assist emerging African farmers.
Hon President, in the past two weeks, we handed over a newly built house to seventy-year-old Sara Kgagodi of Mamusa Local Municipality. This forms part of over three thousand housing units planned for this financial year, with a total of two thousand units delivered to beneficiaries in the third quarter.
Madam Speaker, we have constructed four strategic road projects to the tune of over four hundred twenty million rand in Mmadinonyane, Maubane, Schweizer-Reneke and Ottosdal.
Hon Members, we were the first province to introduce breakfast in three hundred schools in economically depressed communities to cushion learners against high poverty levels in their localities. Plans are already in motion to serve two meals per day in all deserving schools across the four districts of the province and soon I will be making an announcement on how this programme will be implemented.
We have also set aside ten million rand for the benefit of poor yet academically deserving students through the Victor Thebe Sifora Provincial Bursary Scheme to enrol at various institutions of their choice in this academic year.
Hon Speaker, we are a province hard at work committed to change the lives of our people for the better.
And we are unflinching in our resolve to see to the full realization of the plans we have set for ourselves because our revolution as Thomas Sankara once opined “is not a public-speaking tournament nor a battle of fine phrases. Our revolution is not simply for spouting slogans that are no more than signals used by manipulators trying to use them as catchwords, as codewords, as a foil for their own display. Our revolution is, and should continue to be, the collective effort of revolutionaries to transform reality, to improve the concrete situation of the masses of our country.” I thank you!
