President Zuma has held out the promise of boosting skills and jobs with a massive infrastructure development drive involving road, rail and water projects aimed at increasing mining, and expanding transport and logistics networks.
The government has been pushing infrastructure as a means of kickstarting the economy and reducing unemployment since at least 2010. However, his fourth State of the Nation address, delivered at Parliament last night, did not give any report-back on the progress of previously announced plans.
Cosatu general secretary Zwelinzima Vavi said Zuma had sent the right message and welcomed the infrastructure plans. But he was disappointed that Zuma had not announced the scrapping of labour brokers, and said the labour federation’s planned March 7 strike on this issue and e-tolling would go ahead.
Zuma on Thursday night, devoted much of his 18-page speech to a streamlined cluster of major projects involving mainly Limpopo, Mpumalanga, North West, the Eastern Cape, KwaZulu-Natal and the Western Cape.
Zuma also announced moves to cut the cost of doing business – including a reduction in port charges, which will help exporters, particularly in the auto industry – and asking Eskom to find ways of keeping electricity price hikes in check.
He also said a special fund he announced two years ago to help people buy their own homes would be rolled out in April.
The R1 billion loan guarantee fund would allow people who did not qualify for free RDP houses but who did not earn enough to qualify for mortgages to get loans from banks. Also, people earning between R3 500 and R15 000 would from April be able to get a subsidy of up to R83 000 from provinces to help them buy houses through an accredited bank.
Zuma said the cabinet, at its January lekgotla, had reviewed progress from 2009, rather than the past year, noting steady progress in key areas including healthcare, education, fighting crime, human settlements, energy, water provision and rural development.
But the triple challenges of unemployment, poverty and inequality remained: “Africans, women and the youth continue to suffer most.”
As mining was a critical jobs-driver, the government had developed a beneficiation strategy to create job opportunities.
Zuma said the “massive investment in infrastructure must leave more than just power stations, rail lines, dams and roads”.
The projects include:
*Road, rail and water projects in the Waterberg and Steelpoort areas in Limpopo;
* Expanded rail networks in Mpumalanga to connect coalfields to power stations;
* A Durban-Free-State-Gauteng logistics and industrial corridor, and better connection with ports;
* Developing a new node to boost industrial and agricultural development in the Eastern Cape, expanding its links with the Northern Cape and KwaZulu-Natal, and damming the Umzimvubu River in former Transkei.
Zuma put no price tag on the drive but said Transnet would plough R300 billion into capital projects over the next seven years, with R200bn for rail and ports.
He said R300m had been allocated for preliminary work towards establishing universities in Limpopo and Mpumalanga.
Noting the improved crime statistics, Zuma said the government would not become complacent.
On corruption, he said the entire state procurement system was under review by the Treasury, Sars and the Financial Intelligence Centre. This included vetting supply-chain staff in government departments. - Political Bureau