State of the Province Address by Premier Kaobitsa Bushy Maape, North West Provincial Legislature 18 February 2022

The People of the North West,

Madame Speaker, the Honourable Suzan Dantjie, Deputy Speaker, Honourable Viola Motsumi, Chief Whip, Honourable Paul Sebego, Honourable Members of the Executive Council,

Honourable Members of the Provincial Legislature, Honourable Members of Parliament here present, Our delegates to the National Council of Provinces Chairperson of the SALGA, Executive Mayor Molefe,

Chairperson of the House of Traditional Leaders, Kgosi Mabe, Executive Mayors and Mayors of North West Municipalities, Leaders of political parties,

Leaders of faith-based organisations,

Leaders of trade unions and other civil society organisations, Head of Departments and CEOs of Public Entities,

The Provincial Commissioner of the SA Police Service Heads of our Security Services,

Section 100 Administrators,

Director General and Administrator in the Office of the Premier Members of the Diplomatic Corps,

Members of the media, Fellow compatriots,

Madame Speaker and Honourable Members, it is my distinct honour and privilege to stand before this House to present the 2022 State of the Province Address to the people of the North West.

We stand here today fortified by the full knowledge of the support of our people, their pride, optimism, hard work, their diversity which underscores the strength of our province.

We are a special Province. We are a beautiful Province.

Our people are warm hearted, they are talented, they love their country, their province and their localities.

The spirit of the people of this province can be summarised by using the words of the famous Nigerian poet Ben Okri who calls it “our capacity to create, to overcome, to endure, to transform, to love and to be greater than our suffering”

This unique capacity described by Ben Okri is exemplified by the following compatriots who in their daily lives seek to do well to the province and its people, and hoist the good name of the North West to the limitless heights of the skies.

• Agnes Rasesemola, a principal of Sunrise View Secondary School in Rustenburg, scooped the African Union Continental Teacher’s Award.

• Kutlwano Tshatiwa, a Grade 11 pupil of Gabonewe High School in Madikwe won a gold award at the Turkish International Science Fair Competition.

• Stephen Mokoka who grew up in the dusty streets of Ramatlabama, won the Cape Town Marathon in October 2021.

• Maberethe Football Club from Lonely Park in Mahikeng, qualified to play in the ABC Motsepe League, this they did without losing a single game.

• Nomtiti Cultural Ensemble from Mahikeng won the main award for Best Traditional Music Group at the South African Traditional Music Award.

• Mr George Gabuza of Gabza’s Construction and Transport in Moretele who offered a lending hand by building a new house for the Kgwadi family who were victims of floods in Pheding section of Lebotlwane village in the Moretele local Municipality.

Motswana a re mabogo dinku a thebana, Matlo go sha mabapi ! Mens help Mekaar!

Hon Members, efforts of these patriots and many others are often undermined by negative stories, emanating from our Province, stories of corruption, instability, in fighting, poor service delivery and general perceptions of incompetence.

Hon members, we want to turn the North West into a working province guided by values of respect, accountability, professionalism, listening, caring and responsive government.

We need to change these negative perceptions of the Province, and this we are doing by developing a new culture of service delivery and good governance.

We acknowledge the failures of our past, and in some instances our present. Our people still do not have reliable water in some areas, sewer still flows in some of our localities and some of our roads are still not easily trafficable due to potholes.

Hon Members, it is my firm belief that all challenges of service delivery are within our ability to resolve and require government, communities, business and labour unions to work together.

To respond to these challenges past and present, we have adopted an Accelerated Service Delivery Programme, whose unique approach is a joint and collaborative effort to deliver basic services to change the face of governance of municipalities in the province.

If we are unable to resolve basic challenges at a local level, our people will not believe that we can address bigger social challenges of crime, poverty, inequality, and unemployment.

Failure to deliver basic services, has now escalated and impact economic activities, thereby stifling production capacities of many businesses, and causing further hardships through job losses.

Honourable Speaker, our economy has taken a battering due to the impact of Covid 19 pandemic, Provincial GDP contracted by 7,6% in 2020.

Economic recovery is projected to be about 6% of GDP in 2021 and 1,9% in 2022.

One of the challenges we are facing, however, is that economic recovery in terms of GDP is not necessarily translating into proportional recovery in the number of jobs lost during the worst time of the Covid 19 pandemic.

The unemployment rate in the North West currently stands at 35,7%, with youth unemployment at an all-time high of 63%.

These levels of unemployment are described as a ticking time-bomb which requires different social partners to work together in finding lasting solutions.

As part of the process to address the challenges of unemployment, we have in the last months been engaging with different sectors of the economy, in order to develop a common platform within which economic growth and job creation can be addressed.

In the last month we engaged with the mining sector at the North West Mining Investment Conference. We interacted with the agricultural and tourism sectors, which are critical to the growth of the provincial economy.

Honourable Members, these interactions with the critical sectors of our economy are a build up towards the Provincial Jobs Summit to be held in May 2022. The summit involve organised labour, business and other stakeholders. The focus of the job summit will take forward outcomes of our engagements with all role players aimed at building consensus and compacts on growing the economy, in order to create jobs.

During our engagements, it became evident that the tourism sector in particular has been hard hit by the restrictions on travel as a consequence of the Covid 19 pandemic.

With the relaxation of travel restrictions, however, there is an upturn particularly in respect of domestic tourism.

Madam Speaker, In the course of our engagement with the agricultural sector and my travels throughout the Province, it has become clear that we have potential for agricultural production and for associated agro- processing activities beyond the levels that currently obtain.

In the year ahead our Dept of Agriculture and Rural Development will be taking forward it’s Crop Massification Programme and will also be finalizing the Irrigation Master Plan for the Province, which will include optimizing effective use of the Taung, Disaneng, Molatedi and Hartebeespoort Irrigation Schemes.

There is also a potential for engaging in the production of new crops, and the cultivation of arable land previously neglected in all the four districts. In this regard, I am pleased to indicate that the Department is stepping up its development and implementation of the national Cannabis Master Plan, whose primary objective is commercialization of cannabis for medicinal and industrial use within the food and beverage space.

Ladies and Gentlemen, We recognise that it is a shared task to grow the economy and to create jobs.

Our experience through engagements with various stakeholders, is that our economic recovery is inextricably connected to the effective and reliable delivery of basic services.

This was sharply raised in our interaction with amongst others, the North West Chamber of Commerce and Industry (NWCoCI) towards the end of last year.

We have placed partnerships and social compacts at the apex of our sector interface, and in this regard have already concluded an agreement to set up teams to assist in tackling service delivery challenges. These teams will include organised labour across all sectors of our economy.

The Ditsobotla Municipality was identified as the best place to start building the relationship between government, business and labour, given that this municipality was one of the worst affected by service delivery breakdowns in the course of 2021.

I would like to use this occasion to extend a word of appreciation to the North West Chamber of Commerce and Industry and to the Lichtenburg Business Chamber for the constructive way in which they are collaborating with government in this regard.

I want to mention within this context, the Noord Wes Korporasie (NWK) which concluded an agreement with the provincial Dept of Public Works and Roads, whereby the NWK assist with maintenance of certain rural gravel roads in the province.

This approach is being replicated in other parts of the province as is the case in Madibeng Local Municipality where mining houses have offered to provide both engineering expertise and project management skills in speeding up the expansion of the Brits Water Treatment Works, a project that has been delayed for many years.

I would like to believe that we are making progress in building consensus that the road to better service delivery is better served by cooperation rather than litigation, and we are committed as this administration, to building these relationships further in the year ahead.

Hon Speaker, as part of creating job opportunities in our province, we will pursue efforts to realise the establishment of the Bojanala Special Economic Zone. The Office of the Premier will drive the successful operationalisation of the SEZ working with the Department of Economic Development, Environment, Conservation and Tourism.

Government has identified several MEGA projects. For instance, we will put new impetus to the development of the SMART CITY in the border municipalities of Gauteng and the Madibeng Local Municipality.

In fulfilling our role as a developmental state, we will also be reviewing the role and functions of State-Owned Enterprises in order to ensure that they are properly positioned as effective instruments in the task of economic development and job creation in the province.

Our SMMEs are crucial to the economy and creation of job opportunities.

We report that the SMME Relief Fund administered by the North West Development Corporation (NWDC) has so far paid a total of 4353 beneficiaries resulting in expenditure of more than R22.8 million. This support to SMMEs will be increased and continued.

Honourable Speaker, The delivery of public and social infrastructure is one of the critical drivers of economic recovery and creation of the much needed jobs.

The total provincial infrastructure budget for the 2022/23 financial year is estimated at R4.824 billion and the province will spend in excess of R14 billion on infrastructure over the 2022 MTEF period.

Education will expend in excess of R1.2 billion on maintenance and construction of new schools.

The Department of Health is allocated R581 million in 2022/23 financial year for maintenance, rehabilitation, and construction of health facilities.

Public works and Roads will receive R1.3 billion in 2022/23 for road infrastructure.

The performance and the capacity of provincial departments and state- owned entities to deliver on the infrastructure mandate has not been good if not unsatisfactory.

The under spending of infrastructure expenditure, and loss of conditional grant allocations to the National Revenue Fund is to be addressed as a matter of urgency.

We will revive the Premier’s Infrastructure Coordinating Committee to assess readiness of projects to be implemented in the 2022/23 financial year.

The structure will strengthen the hand of political heads of departments, to hold accounting officers managing infrastructure allocations accountable for failure to deliver on projects. We want to see the ratio being 20% planning and 80% implementation of infrastructure projects.

We have already reached out to the Infrastructure South Africa (ISA) Unit in the Presidency, to assist with the establishment of monitoring capacity in the Office of the Premier to improve infrastructure delivery.

Hon Speaker, We are conscious that the Economic Reconstruction and Recovery Plan will not create sufficient employment opportunities in the short-term. We are therefore determined to ensure that the youth, women and people with disabilities are primary beneficiaries of available work opportunities generated through the delivery of public infrastructure.

A total of 12 494 job opportunities, will be created across all infrastructure delivery departments in the 2022/23 financial year through the Expanded Public Works Programme.

Some of the public infrastructure projects to be implemented by the department of public works include the completion of new schools during the financial year 2022/23; these are Kgabalatsane Secondary Schools, Tlakgameng Secondary School, Tlokwe Secondary School, Tigane Secondary School (Phase2), Kagiso Barolong Secondary School, Monnamere Primary School, Kgetleng Secondary School, Mamodibo High School and Rekgonne Bapo Secondary School.

Ladies and Gentlemen, the recent heavy rains have aggravated the poor conditions of our provincial and rural roads.

We have identified 20 projects for the financial year 2022/23 to be implemented across the four districts, which include amongst others:

• Upgrading from gravel to surface standard of the road from Gamokgatla to Uitkyk.

• Upgrading from gravel to surface standard (tar) of the road from Modimong to Taung.

• Special maintenance of the road in Wolmaranstad town.

• Special maintenance of section of the road between Danville and Dada motors through Mahikeng town.

• Rehabilitation of the road from Delareyville to Schweizer-Reneke

• Pothole patching in large sections of the road from Schweizer Reneke border to Wolmaransstad.

• Reseal of the road from Morokweng to Bona Bona

• Dr Beyers Naude Road in the Lichtenburg Industrial Area

The MEC will provide full details of all the projects and delivery deadlines.

Hon Members, in addition, Public Works Department will complete two new Community Libraries in Dinokana and Wolmaranstad, renovate two Community Libraries in Mabeskraal and Ganyesa.

Five social development facilities will be renovated to cater for child and youth care, an in-patient treatment centre, two old age homes, and a Secure Care Centre.

We will this year in honouring Archbishop Desmond Tutu, construct the Desmond Tutu Old Age Home, and the Desmond Tutu Museum in the Matlosana Local Municipality at the Desmond Tutu Memorial Site donated by the Municipality.

The two departments of Social Development and Arts, Culture & Sport are to include these in their respective departmental plans and provide funding. We will continue our support for the iconic liberation heritage through the Onkgopotse Tiro, JB Marks, Moses Kotane and Ruth Mompati Foundations.

Hon Speaker, this year’s Youth Day will mark the 46th anniversary of the 1976 June 16 uprising.

This day is always an acknowledgement of the sacrifices the youth of this country have made in the struggle for national liberation.

It is also a constant reminder of the critical role the youth will play in the future of our province.

To address the challenges that have faced young people in the past years, the Office of the Premier will convene a Provincial Youth Summit to adopt a Plan for Youth development across all sectors of the economy.

We have enlisted the participation and support of the National Department of Higher Education, Department of Science and Technology, together with the relevant SETA’s.

Hon Speaker, we are not however sitting back and waiting for the Summit.

In addition, to utilising infrastructure delivery, to create jobs for the youth, women, and people with disabilities, a number of interventions are to be implemented across departments.

We will in the coming year massify these interventions.

For the 2020/21 financial year, the Provincial Treasury offered 85 internships.

The Department of Community Safety appointed a total of one thousand, two hundred and sixty-three (1263) community patrollers.

A successful Pilot of the Expanded Public Works Programme (EPWP) in Tourism and Hospitality Placement Initiative, placed 100 Youth in various tourism businesses.

The Social Development Department created 2 368 Extended Public Works Programme (EPWP) opportunities over the 2020/21 financial year.

The Department of Health Pharmacist Assistant Programme was established in 2019 with Health and Welfare Sector Education and Training Authority (HWSETA), to empower unemployed youth in various categories in the health sector.

The programme is also aimed at increasing the number of trained Pharmacy Assistants, thus reducing the staff shortage at Primary Health Care Level and Depots. Since the beginning of the 6th Administration, 764 students have been trained and there are currently 794 students enrolled at colleges.

The Department of Education appointed Four Thousand, Five Hundred and Thirty-Five (4 535) Food Handlers to serve meals to learners during lock down and extended school holidays.

For the financial year 2022/23, the following youth programmes will be implemented in the province:

One Hundred and twenty (120) young people will benefit from the interventions focusing on skills development, in areas of road marking and pothole patching in partnership with DEDECT and the Construction SETA.

DEDECT in partnership with Services SETA (SSETA) will recruit 100 young people to participate in the Business Advisory Candidacy Programme and a further 200 in the Business Advisory Skills Programme.

The Department of Social Development will train additional three hundred (300) youths in terms of the National Youth Service.

R 11million has been set aside through the Agricultural Graduate Programme to train 120 unemployed graduates, who will be placed at various agricultural farms and enterprises across the province.

Hon Members, we have received additional commitments from industry to partner with government to create jobs in tourism, agriculture etc.

A full partnership for Youth Development in the province will be outlined at the Provincial Youth Summit in June this year.

Bagaetsho, This State of the Province Address, comes after the 01 November 2021 local government elections.

We therefore as the provincial government believe that the new Local Government administrations mark the beginning, the fresh start of our continued commitment to providing our communities with services.

Re na le tsholofelo gore tsamaiso ya pusoselegae e tlile go tokafala thata, le go tlisa diphetogo mo thebolong ya ditirelo mo mafelong otlhe mo porofenseng ya rona.

Ga re dumele go tla nna le baeteledipele le batsamaisi ba puso selegae ba ba tla amegang mo tsamaisong e sokameng ya bo mmasepala. Ga re solofele go tla nna jalo, mme fa go ka direga, ba tlile go tseelwa dikgato, fa go tlhokega le go tlosiwa mo maemong a bona.

Ga go kitla go letlwa gore batsamaisi ba ba sentseng mo pusong ya profense le dimasepala, ba bonwe molato, ba hiriwe mo pusong gape.

Madam Speaker and Honourable Members, We in the North West hold the record for the most interventions by a provincial government in municipalities.

We are however excited about the demonstrated positive attitude and willingness to prioritise service delivery by the majority of the newly installed Councillors. We are ready to work with them!

In the coming weeks before the end of April, we will communicate a comprehensive Municipal Governance Support Framework, in line with Section 154 of the Constitution and other enabling legislation.

This Municipal Governance Support Framework will present a proper balance between intervention and support, whilst not neglecting our constitutional authority as Provincial Government where good cause is shown, to use more forceful means to hold councils accountable in pursuance of service delivery to our people.

Our new approach will amongst others introduce a quarter-by-quarter assessment of municipalities, with an intention to deal with and resolve governance issues as they emerge.

This approach will be critical for our overall intention to improve audit outcomes in municipalities.

We have directed that the first audit of the period since November elections to date be conducted in ALL municipalities.

Ladies and Gentlemen, We are concerned by emerging signs of instability in some municipalities, particularly in Ditsobotla Local Municipality as reported in the media over the last weeks. I constituted a team of three MECs to attend to this problem.

We have a clear and simple intention to make municipalities work for our people, irrespective of the party in charge of a municipality or the power balance in a municipality.

Hon Members, this year’s state of the province marks the mid-term for the 6th administration in terms of the 2019-2024 Medium Term Strategic Framework.

We have already provided part of the delivery achievements of the sixth administration in the preceding parts of this speech.

In the period 2010 to 2020 the following progress has been registered:

• Households without access to water decreased from 17,1% to 12,1%

• Households without access to sanitation decreased from 38,9% to 28,7%

• Households without access to electricity decreased from 16,3% to 9,7%

• Households without access to refuse removal decreased from 51,2% to 45,2%

Honourable Speaker, I have already indicated that since September 2021, when this house conferred on me the honour to hold this office, we started implementation of the Accelerated Service Delivery Programme focusing on patching potholes, cleaning dumping sites, fixing sewage systems, provision of water and repairing street lighting.

The first phase of the Accelerated Service Delivery Programme announced in September of last year has already identified and implemented projects with budgets to improve the provision of basic service delivery to achieve immediate impact.

Another key element within the overall Accelerated Service Delivery Programme has been the provision of water to communities across the province. We want to integrate the Accelerated Service Delivery Programme with the Presidential Mass Public Employment Programme so as to renew municipal infrastructure while employing youth from various wards in municipalities.

To deal with the multiple challenges facing the water sector an Interdepartmental Task Team on Water Provision was set up in October of last year, under the leadership of the Dept of COGTA to deal with both short-term crises as well as long term planning issues.

This Task Team worked round the clock, including through the festive season, in order to bring an element of reliability, regularity and good quality in water provision.

Honourable Members, We are elated to announce that, the Ministry of Water and Sanitation has committed an amount of R50m to improve the infrastructure and conveyance of bulk water from Molopo Eye to Mahikeng reservoirs and water treatment plants.

This project will commence soon, and will assist to ensure water security to the residents of Mahikeng.

We will continue in 2022 to provide coordination as this provincial government in addressing short-term challenges of water provision, and in liaising with the national department for sustainable bulk supply of water. This will include speeding up the implementation of water projects such as the Taung Dam, Brits Water Treatment Works and the Bloemhof- Schweizer Renecke pipeline.

Our goal is to ensure that there is no one who goes to sleep at night without access to clean water.

In certain instances, this may require tankering which we see as an interim measure while lasting solutions are sought.

I wish to call on our communities to work together in protecting all infrastructure, including water infrastructure to avoid damage and service provision disruptions.

Madam Speaker and Honourable members, we will soon finalise and lodge our Annual Performance Plans with the Legislature.

Soon thereafter, the department of COGTA will coordinate all municipalities to incorporate all targeted projects and programmes into “One District Plan” approach in order to give practical meaning to the DDM.

We intend to finalise these One Plans before July to enable implementation by municipalities at the beginning of their financial year.

Mmusa kgotla, re ikaegile thata ka kemonokeng ya Ntlo ya rona ya dikgosi ya Porofense ee akaretsang magosi otlhe ka fa tlase ga boeteledipele jwa ga Kgosi Moshe Mabe.

Re lebogela tiro ya dikgosi tsa rona, ya go rotloetsa baagi go entela mogare wa COVID 19 mo magaeng otlhe a North West.

Porofense ya rona ke nngwe ya tse di eteletseng pele ka dipalopalo tsa baagi ba ba entilweng mo nageng. Re itumedisiwa thata ke go bona magosi a tlisa diterelo le ditlhabololo mo baaging ba metse ya bona.

Honourable Speaker, our Province has a total of 56 Traditional Councils.

I wish to commit myself in the presence of all Hon Members and Kgosi Mabe, that we will continue with our programme to visit all Traditional Councils in the Province, hopefully all of the remaining by the end of the year.

The Traditional Khoisan and Leadership Act, Act No 3 of 2019 has opened the way for the establishment and elections of new Traditional Councils.

The full process for the election and establishment of new councils in our villages will be finalised by 2023.

We have no doubt that given the good relations between Government and the House of Traditional Leaders, this process will run smoothly to ensure stable governance in our Traditional Councils.

Mmusa Kgotla, we have established a Provincial Initiation Coordinating Committee for the Province.

This Committee assisted the Province in ensuring that the 2021/22 initiation season is concluded successfully without any major health incidents or deaths. Kudos to our traditional initiation coordinators and managers!

Mmusa Kgotla, let me now turn to share with this house elements of our programme of action for the coming year, 2022/23:

We will drive the implementation of the gender responsive planning, budgeting, and monitoring.

We will work with communities and law enforcement agencies to improve case management and combating of crime and offences against LGBTIQ+ communities. Our GBV strategy and plan is to actively involve government on a regular and continuous basis in GBV programmes, working with relevant stakeholders to combat this scourge.

The Department of Health will implement measures to address backlogs in relation to medicine stock shortages in our public health facilities and improve stocking levels.

We will expand Covid 19 vaccination sites from the current 62 to all the 304 health facilities in the province.

In line with our efforts to fight COVID 19, we will drive our vaccination campaign to reach the target of 67% population immunity.

We will release over 48 farm portions in line with government’s socio-economic objectives, including land reform, black economic empowerment, and alleviation of poverty.

We will improve coordination of the programme of the Military veterans across all departments. I have also directed my office to start coordination efforts to extend the programme to the veterans of the liberation struggle.

We will accelerate the development and implementation of revenue enhancement strategies in all municipalities.

We will assist ex-mine workers in collaboration with the National Department of Health and Trade unions, to access ex-miners to access all their social protection benefits which are due to them.

Hon Members, two reports from the Commission investigating corruption in state institutions and State Capture (Zondo Commission) have been handed to the President and released to the public.

Part 1 of these reports contain serious allegations of corruption and wrong doing related to the SA Express contract issued by the North West Provincial Government.

I wish to state upfront that we take the findings contained in Part 1 of the report very seriously, and have directed both the affected Department and the Provincial Treasury to prepare a plan to be adopted by the Executive Council, on how to implement the commission’s findings and recommendations.

We are also aware that the FINAL report of the commission to be released at a later stage will contain final findings and recommendations to the President.

Whatever approach we adopt, I can guarantee the public that we will be guided by the law to lay criminal charges, recover state funds and institute appropriate disciplinary actions where such are recommended in the report.

Hon Speaker, I held a meeting with the Head of the Special Investigation Unit to receive update on the work of the SIU in the Province.

Following the publication of the SIU investigations report on the PPE contracts, all MECs and Accounting Officers are expected to act on all recommendations on disciplinary cases cited in this report before the end of March 2022.

Hon Members, within the next 30 days, we will announce further investigations following legal consultations with both the President and the Minister of Justice & Correctional Services.

In May this year we will consult with various stakeholders to table and adopt the first Anti-Corruption Strategy for the North West Province and adopt a pledge committing government and all social partners to implement measures to combat corruption in society in general.

Hon Speaker, in supporting our efforts for clean government, we have launched the “Clean Audit” initiative coordinated by Provincial Treasury to improve audit outcomes.

We are pleased to report that the Province has improved in terms of reduction of qualified audit outcome from 61.5% during 2018/19 to 38.5% during 2020/21 financial year.

The Clean Audit strategy has already identified four (4) departments which we believe have the most potential to achieve clean audits in the next auditing cycle;( Arts, Culture, Sports and Recreation; Economic Development, Environment, Conservation and Tourism; Social Development and the North West Provincial Legislature).

Madam Speaker should be pleased that the Provincial Legislature is part of the list.

Honourable Members, It is now more than three years since five department were placed under section 100(1)(b) including the office of the Premier, and five more issued with ministerial directives under section 100(1)(a) of the Constitution. We want to report that the intervention contributed to the stabilisation of government in the province.

I want to express our sincere gratitude to the President, the national ministers and their deployees who have tirelessly worked under difficult conditions to serve the North West in its hour of need.

Madam Speaker, participatory democracy remains one of the key pillars of our constitution and an important guide in building a national democratic society.

It calls for regular participation of the people, not only in electing public representatives, but also in making inputs on matters affecting their lives. In order to realise improved and consistent interaction between the people and their public representatives at all levels, we will revive the Imbizo Program.

We will improve on our outreach programs and develop a systematic mechanism for implementing commitments from the Imbizo sessions.

Hon Members, I am pleased to announce that the North West will be the first Province that will be visited by His Excellency the President of the Republic, Hon. Cyril Ramaphosa to take forward the revamped Imbizo Program as part of his post SONA engagements with communities.

This Presidential Imbizo is planned for early March this year and it is expected that the visit will serve as a helping hand to our Accelerated Service Delivery initiative and implementation of the DDM.

We will also use the occasion to brief the President on the work done by our Municipalities since November 2021 Municipal Elections.

Madame Speaker allow me to conclude by reminding the people of the North West that we are conscious of the fact that in the eyes of the people, clean governance means an ethical state geared to meet the social needs and to realise economic and political rights of citizens.

In order to deliver on the commitments we are making in this august House today, we need a properly structured and capacitated Office of the Premier, to discharge its mandate on coordination, monitoring and evaluation.

The Office of the Premier is the central coordinating point for policy and programme implementation of focussed interventions on the Rights of the Child, Older Persons, Persons with Disabilities, Women Empowerment and People Living with HIV and Aids.

It is critical that this Office be capacitated to perform these functions.

In this regard, the Executive Council has resolved that a review of the structure in the Office of the Premier should be done to strengthen its coordination capacity also as it relates to youth, project management, anti- corruption, investigations, and compliance monitoring.

ALL OF US! ALL OF US TOGETHER! WE COMMIT OURSELVES TO CREATING A BETTER LIFE FOR ALL THE PEOPLE OF THIS BEAUTIFUL PROVINCE.

This province will bounce back and claim its rightful place in South Africa and history.

I thank you people of the North West Ke a Leboga baagi ba North West Ndiyabulela A bahlali ba se North West Baie Dankie inwoners van North West

Source: Government of South Africa