Note to Broadcasters: Please find attached soundbite in English by Freddy Sonakile
The North West MEC of Finance, Motlalepula Rosho’s, budget speech delivered this morning makes big promises that the ANC-led provincial government cannot deliver.
The bulk of the provincial budget is earmarked for the public sector wage bill, in short, 63% of the budget goes to compensation of employees, leaving a mere 37% to fund service delivery and infrastructure maintenance and development.
In addition, the ANC-led provincial government is in the process of borrowing R2 billion through ‘frontloading’, thus using future Housing Grants as collateral. We are concerned about the impact this loan would have on the next government’s ability to fund and deliver public services in an already constrained environment.
An additional R70 million is allocated to Public Works and Roads for resealing and pothole patching of our roads. Included in this amount is the promise of re-establishing Asphalt Material factories in all four municipal districts. However, no mention was made about the state of these factories established previously.
The ANC in government is notorious for launching projects but then fail to extend the necessary support to ensure long-term viability, through which millions of Rands are funnelled. All the bakeries initiated by the Department of Economic Developoment, Environmet, Conservation and Tourism (DEDECT) as well as the bricklaying plants have closed shop leaving no return on investments, resulting in fruitless and wasteful expenditure.
An investment of R6,98 billion was poured into roads and infrastructure over the last 5 years yet the general state of provincial roads and public infrastructure is of decay and dilapidation. All we got for almost R7 billion was more potholes.
Interestingly, MEC Rosho announced yet another financial rescue plan, now called the Financial Recovery Plan (FRP). Despite all the attempts over the past 5 years through the Section 100 interventions, task teams, financial recovery plans, the financial state of the provincial government remains dire. There are still no clean audits in North West while every single municipality has practically collapsed and continues to fail residents by not supplying basic services such as clean water and electricity.
Budgetary pressure is not an excuse for poor service delivery. Budgetary pressures have existed since the start of this government’s term, and quite frankly, the ANC in government caused these pressures themselves through fraud, corruption, malfeasance, coupled with their destructive economic policies.
MEC Rosho allocated R450 million towards scholar transport. We reiterate our concerns about the manner scholar transport is managed in this province. Especially considering the damning findings by the SIU last year against the department of COSATMA for irregularly awarding scholar transport contracts. The department awarded several new contracts late last year, and we have already received several complaints about the poor state of this service from learners, parents and teachers. Recently 20 learners were injured in an accident involving a bus which was poorly maintained.
A R10 million was made to Public Works and Roads for the Desmond Tutu Precinct in Matlosana, however, in 2022/23 an amount of R5 million was allocated to the Department of Arts, Culture, Sport and Recreation for the construction of the Desmond Tutu Museum which was never done. Another project never seeing the light of day, and yet millions of Rands vanished.
This budget, just like this North West ANC-led government, will not and cannot address the desperate need for quality basic services residents have. There is no plan and zero funding towards attracting investment to grow the economy to create jobs for the almost 1 million jobless people in North West.
This budget shows that the ANC no longer has an interest in governing for the people. Thankfully, the DA has a plan to rescue this province and our country. A DA government will allocate funding towards improving people’s lives through quality service delivery, like we do in the Western Cape and in every municipality we govern, where we allocate every cent of government money towards improving people’s lives.
North West residents today know that this budget tabled by MEC Rosho is reason enough to abandon the ANC at the ballot on 29 May and vote in a DA-led government that will put them first.