Speech by Minister Patricia De Lille at the Hermanus Harbour Infrastructure upgrades inspection
Infrastructure Investment the key to unlocking economic growth and creating jobs for our industries and people
Executive Mayor of Overstrand Municipality, Dr Annelie Rabie
Deputy Mayor of Overstrand Municipality, Cllr Lindile Ntsabo
Paramount Chief, Louis Gardiner
Head of Infrastructure South Africa, Dr Kgosientsho Ramokgopa
Mayoral Committee Member for Economic Development in the Overstrand Municipality, Cllr
Elnora Gillion
Municipal Manager, Dean O’Neill
Harbour Master and Chairperson of Harbour Users Committee, Ms Nomonde Simon
Mr Julius Booysen from the Overstrand Association Person with Disability association
representing the traders
Mr Craig Gillion, Mentor and Trainer to the divers
Our young people, trained divers
All officials and guests
Good afternoon, Good Morning, Goeie More, Molweni, as-salaamu ailakum, shalom.
It is my great pleasure to be with you all today as we launch this new multi-purpose center at the Hermanus Harbour to boost local economic development ahead of what will hopefully be a busy
tourism season.
Mayor Rabie, Deputy Mayor and your delegation, we are glad to have you with us as key partners in this project’s continued success especially to allow greater access to the harbour for traders
and the fishing community so that their operations and contribution to the local economy and job creation can grow.
I am also very happy to have some of the local traders here and our young people from surrounding communities who received formal diving training and were empowered through this
project.
The Small Harbours Repairs and Maintenance Programme in the Department of Public Works and Infrastructure is one of the projects I am very proud of.
The project has been moving smoothly across 13 proclaimed fishing harbours in the Western Cape bringing much needed infrastructure improvements to the harbours for the benefit of coastal
communities.
It also speaks to a firm belief I have that infrastructure development must not just be about new infrastructure but upgrading and doing repairs and maintenance to existing infrastructure thus
increasing the lifespan of the state’s assets.
The primary purpose of the repairs and maintenance programme is to bring the harbours to a greater operational efficiency to assist the Department of Environment, Forestry and Fisheries (DEFF) to carry out their mandate effectively with the enabling infrastructure provided by DPWI. The programme also aims to boost investor confidence within the harbours and many existing
tenants are looking to expand their operations.
This is coupled with a high appetite from new investors within the harbour which will assist the DPWI in its drive towards attracting private sector investment and revenue generation for the state.
The Small Harbours Repairs and Maintenance Programme has been progressing well at all 13 proclaimed fishing harbours (PFHs) namely; Lamberts Bay, Laaiplek / Bergrivier Harbour, St Helena Bay, Saldanha Bay, Pepper Bay, Hout Bay, Kalk Bay, Gordons Bay, Hermanus, Gansbaai, Arniston, Struisbaai and Stilbaai.
The programme identified the following scope of work in each of the 13 harbours where applicable: removal of sunken vessels, dredging of the harbour basins, repairs to slipways, shore crane
replacements, security Infrastructure upgrades, civil Infrastructure upgrades and electrical infrastructure upgrades.
South Africa has over 3 000 km’s of coastline where there are 13 proclaimed fishing harbours that lie exclusively within the Western Cape.
The function of the DPWI’s Small Harbours Unit is to play an integral role in contributing towards achieving the National Development Plan 2030 goals as well as addressing the country’s triple challenge i.e. unemployment, poverty and inequality.
I am very pleased to hear that the overall progress of the programme against the priority scope of work is currently at 94% completion with the planned completion date of March 2022 still on track.
The removal of sunken vessels activity has been completed at 7 of the 13 harbours which housed sunken vessels. A total of 29 sunken vessels were removed of which 15 of these were at Hout Bay
Harbour.
The Department capitalized on this opportunity at Hout Bay Harbour by also training 9 locals, some who were former poachers, as Class 3 Commercial Divers.
All dredging works have been completed at the required 8 of the 13 harbours. This had to follow in succession of the removal of sunken vessels to allow for the harbour basins to be dredged effectively.
The repairs and upgrades to slipways have been completed at all of the harbours with the exception of Saldanha Bay Harbour. Progress at the Saldanha Bay slipway is currently at 58% in November
2021.
The land infrastructure upgrades have also been completed at all of the harbours with the exception of Saldanha and Pepper Bay Harbours. The progress at Saldanha Bay and Pepper Bay Harbours
under the land infrastructure upgrades is currently at 52% complete.
At Hermanus Harbour the following are some of the works that have been completed by DPWI’s contractors; slipway repairs and shore crane replacements includes, extensive renovation and repairs to the vandalized Lusitania Building office block and installation of an extensive CCTV camera network system.
With this project we are showing government’s commitment to infrastructure development to create the conditions conducive for economic growth and job creation by the private sector. The Infrastructure Investment Plan and this project is also an integral part of the country’s Economic Reconstruction and Recovery plan to enable economic growth and create much needed jobs for citizens.
To date the overall repair and maintenance programme to the proclaimed fishing harbours has created a total of 737 jobs.
The 737 jobs are disaggregated as follows: Youth: 390; People with disabilities: 3; Women: 98; and Men: 639.
At the Hermanus Harbour project, a total of 92 jobs were created under the land infrastructure project.
The project also included the training of 12 divers under the electrical infrastructure contract resulting in youths from the disadvantaged areas in close proximity to the harbour being identified
as beneficiaries.
The youths received training to do conduct electrical cabling under the quayside was the catalyst for changing their lives. The overall cost of the Small Harbours Repairs and Maintenance Programme amounts to R500million.
The investment into the land infrastructure upgrades to the Hermanus Harbour amounted to just over R15million.
In terms of empowerment of local companies, the Hermanus land infrastructure project SMME target spend amounted to approximately R6.75 million.
For the Hermanus harbour project, the following local SMMEs were contracted: Maditaba Construction, Ngojo Projects, JJAD, Noxy Cleaning Projects, Mbane Scaffolding, Fred’s Plumbing, Blu-Vine Technologies, Ambassador, Mfezi and Daughters, Wapipa Construction and BSS Security.
The prescribed minimum of 30% to local SMME empowerment has been exceeded at this project in Hermanus with 45% of the project spend benefitting local SMMEs.
The overall Small Harbours Repairs and Maintenance Programme has also empowered local SMMEs to the value of approximately R90 million.
We are now standing in front of and launching the new multi-purpose centre today to be utilized by local traders as their space to sell their wares. We are working with the Overstrand Municipality to finalise a Memorandum of Understanding to formalise the use of this multi-purpose centre by local traders and this is in the final stages of being concluded.
The terms of this MOU must clearly outline the type of small businesses that can benefit from this project and be housed here with a clear focus on businesses previously excluded from operating
here.
In closing, to the young people who were trained as divers for this project, I want to say to you, that you can be proud of yourselves for what you have achieved here.
Let this be a motivation to you that where you come from or your circumstances do not matter. You determine your own destiny and you can be a success and be anything you want to be.
Ladies and gentlemen, the success of this programme and the overall Infrastructure Investment Plan relies on good cooperation by all partners and all three spheres of government.
Let us continue to work closely together with the people of our country in mind so that we do our part to enable economic growth and job creation for the people of our country.
Thank you once again to everyone for their work on this project and let’s keep up the good work and see the operations at the harbour be a resounding success for the harbour management, the traders and the local economy.
Thank you and God Bless
Source: Government of South Africa