Hon House Chair;

Hon Members

It gives me great honour to stand here and remind you of the ANCs January 08 statement of 1985 in which Oliver Reginald Tambo opined as follows’ “…South Africa is littered with the graves of young patriots who were massacred by the apartheid regime in 1976 and in the subsequent years. This self-same regime, which bears responsibility for these crimes, has with great impudence, decided to observe the International Year of the Youth, whose motto is the: Participation, Development and Peace.” Here we are Hon Members 50 years after 1976 making a clarion call that any development agenda must be deliberate in annihilating the scourge of unemployment amongst our youth.

Hon House Chair as the African National Congress we support the Budget vote for the Departments of Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs, the Municipal Infrastructure Support Agent, the South African Local Government Association, the Municipal Demarcation Board, and the Commission for Promotion and Protection of the Rights of Cultural, Religious, and Linguistic Communities.

Hon Minister we are in agreement with your intention to support as enjoined by Section 154 of the Constitution of 20 rural district municipalities and four metropolitan municipalities – Buffalo City, Nelson Mandela, City of Johannesburg and eThekwini.

Hon Chairperson as the legislative arm of the state we will continue to exercise oversight as guided by the sector oversight model in the following focus areas amongst others:

• The Twenty-two municipalities that are targeted for revenue enhancement.
• The department’s tabling of  the Local Government: General Laws Amendment Bill in Parliament by 31 March 2027.
• The promotion of local government professionalization as envisaged through the establishment of the national data base for dismissed municipal officials. This attempt is aimed at eliminating the mobility within the system by serial offenders.
• The proclaimed 100 percent of the commitments relating to the review of the White Paper on Local Government.

Hon Minister we are concerned about the downward spiral of our economy which has resulted in high levels of unemployment that is hitting our youth hardest. The Community Works  Programme remains a positive contribution to the unemployed cohort of our people. It is therefore an unwelcome pain to observe 90 000 cut from 250 000 to 160 000 participants. No further cut Hon Minister in this program.

MUNICIPAL INFRASTRUCTURE SUPPORT AGENT (MISA)

Hon House Chair and Hon Members we will closely monitor all the commitments made by this entity for the current financial year. Those commitments are inclusive of the following amongst others:

1.  technical support teams to the nine provinces, prioritising low-capacity municipalities. The output indicators emphasize wastewater treatment infrastructure and infrastructure related technical skills training for 300 young graduates and apprentices as to improve their employment prospects.
2. Infrastructure delivery management as epitomised by leveraging partnerships between public and private sectors.

CONCLUSION: 

The African National Congress prides itself as the product of the institution of traditional leadership as reflected in its leadership for the past 114 years. We are therefore making an impassioned plea to everybody in this august house to join us in making sure that the Traditional and Khoisan Leadership Bill succeeds. We dare not fail!!!

Thank you very much!!!