The Northern Cape provincial Government has partnered with the Sol Plaatje Local municipality by investing half a billion towards urgent infrastructure challenges.
Northern Cape Premier Dr Zaman Saul announced during a media conference on 8 April that the money will be used to bring the sparkle back to the city within the next 12 months.
Saul indicated that infrastructure challenges such as sewage, water leakages and damaged roads will be a thing of the past by the end of this year.
The Premier committed to putting the implementation of the investment immediately into action on 12 April.
R215 million will go towards urgent maintenance work on fighting potholes, sewer and water leakages. However, he warned that the city will be turned into a construction site.
According to the premier, the intervention was triggered by the recent service delivery challenges facing the Sol Plaatje Municipality, and the resultant discomfort and anger amongst residents in the city.
The Sol Plaatje municipality came under attack two weeks ago when residents barricaded the roads demanding better service delivery.
Several communities in informal settlements, and homeowners were also left frustrated after being left out during recent rains.
The municipality’s poor drainage system was under the spotlight.
The Premier said they have been engaging in a series of meetings with the Sol Plaatje and the District Municipality to formulate an immediate intervention to address the service delivery backlogs and challenges.
“The intervention has as its primary focus the improvement of quality of services and to put in place a turnaround strategy to speed up and improve service delivery. This is the biggest single infrastructure investment in one year for this municipality. Kimberley is the face of the Province and we must make significant investments to strengthen the city’s capacity to deliver services and generate growth for the entire province,” said Saul.
Breaking down the figures, Saul said R180 million will go towards roads maintenance and deal with resealing and potholes; while R20 million will be spent towards addressing water and sewage leakages. An amount of R15 million will be spent on cleaning the city while R 71 million will go towards Temporary Residential Units for the residents that were affected by the recent rainfalls and floods.
Of this amount, R44 million will be spent in the Sol Plaatje municipal area,” said Saul.
The Premier said R144 million will be allocated to the ground breaking Hull Street Social Housing project.
“This will go a long way in addressing the fundamental challenges of human settlement and the Apartheid Spatial planning. R37 Million will go towards the establishment of 2 933 sites. Out of this a total of 1 314 will have services installed,” highlighted Saul.
He mentioned that R53 million has been signed off for the purchase of land next to the N12 leading to Johannesburg for mixed housing delivery.
Dr Saul also pointed out that a purchase agreement has been signed for the Eskom building to the tune of R 16 million to address social housing needs.
In view of the technical capacity challenges at the municipality, Saul said that the Provincial Government has put in place an Implementation Task Team (ITT) comprising of engineers from the Departments of Cooperative Governance, Human Settlements and Traditional Affairs; and Roads and Public Works and the Sol Plaatje and Frances Baard Municipalities.
The ITT is expected to include senior officials from the Provincial Treasury.
According to the Premier, the team will be convened by the Senior Advisor in the Office of the Premier, Norman Shushu; MECs Vass, Vosloo and Makatong; and the two Mayors Marekwa and Mabilo who will give political leadership and report weekly to the Premier’s Office.
“This intervention demonstrates the Provincial Government’s commitment to addressing the social and service delivery challenges faced by our communities,” said Saul.
He called on the citizens to protect municipal infrastructure and work closely with law enforcement agencies in reporting any vandalism and destruction of municipal property.
The call was made with regards to the high level of vandalism of municipal infrastructure which left community members suffering from water and electricity outages.
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