The Minister of Public Works and Infrastructure:
a) Neither the Department of Public Works and Infrastructure (DPWI) nor any of its entities are involved in the implementation of the Department of Basic Education (DBE) project for the cleaning and sanitising of schools. The decision for the non-involvement of the DPWI on this project is premised on the resolutions of the meeting held on the 27 May 2020 between the Directors-General of DPWI, DBE, and National Treasury (NT), where it was agreed that the cleaning of schools is a Provincial Department of Education function. It was further agreed that the funding for the screening and cleaning activities at schools must be through the respective Provincial Departments of Education budget. Due to the financial constraints of Provincial Department of Education,the DBE and NT agreed to fund this activity by reallocating funds from the DBE Infrastructure Grant. Around R4,4 billion was allocated to this activity during the Adjustment Budget presented by the Minister of Finance in July 2020.
b) No management fee is charged to the DPWI as it is not involved in the implementation of the project.
c) Since the DPWI and the IDT are not involved in the implementation of the programme, the DPWI is not in a position to ascertain which NPOs are involved in the DBE initiative.
d) Since the DPWI and the IDT are not involved in the implementation of the programme, the DPWI is:
(i) not in a position to ascertain the number of NPOs involved in the DBE initiative.
(ii) not in a position to ascertain, for now, the number of participants already engaged in the DBE initiative. However once the DBE reports the participants into the EPWP Reporting System, this information will be available.
(iii) notaware of the schools benefiting from the programme.
e) The DPWI is not possession of the relevant details of schools benefitting from the programme.