Chairperson, hon Ministers, hon members of the NCOP, the portfolio chairperson from the Eastern Cape legislature, ladies and gentlemen, the director-general, members of the Department of Human Settlements, warm greetings from the Eastern Cape on this cold evening. Human settlements development in the province is at the apex of both rural and urban integrated development and it is expected to occupy a significant and central role in the developmental agenda for our people by their government in the province.
Our province continues to make remarkable strides to turn around the fortunes of our people towards a better life for all through human settlements development. This is happening amidst many challenges that continue to beset our beautiful province.
This year, a portion of the conditional grant allocation for 2013-14 will be used to enhance human settlements development in selected small towns. This will be utilised to unblock services that are stalling the implementation of housing projects. More than 25 000 housing units, ultimately within three to five years, will be unblocked in this process. Not only low-cost housing shall benefit from this intervention but also social and affordable rental housing in areas where the demand has been confirmed by the feasibility studies that have been conducted.
This is intended to stimulate local economic development in these small towns. As such, this intervention strategically blends with the small town revitalisation programme of our province and with the strategic infrastructure interventions targeting mostly rural municipalities, which was announced by the President during his state of the nation address.
As a province, we have also initiated a turnkey rural housing project called -Project 12K|, comprising a total of 12 247 units. The construction of these units is to be undertaken at this time by high-performing capacity contractors and developers. Each individual project will be divided into approximately 1 000 units. These are the areas that will benefit: Mbizana, Matatiele and the whole of O R Tambo District Municipality.
The scope entails planning, beneficiary administration, social facilitation, design and, ultimately, the construction of top structures. The objective is to fast-track the implementation of rural housing projects in the province. The majority of our people still reside in the eastern part of our province.
This year, the department will continue to facilitate the youth development programmes within the sectors through collaboration with district municipalities, the National Home Builders Registration Council and the National Youth Development Agency, NYDA. The programme is informed by the framework for participation and empowerment of youth in human settlements that was approved by the technical Minmec on 10 March 2012.
The YouthBuild programme will be rolled out in four districts, adopting the same approach of imparting technical skills to unemployed youth in the identified regions through collaboration with the Department of Public Works, the NYDA and the National Home Builders Registration Council.
We are also prioritising the matter of title deeds so that beneficiaries can legally own their properties. As a result, a process has begun to assume the overall function of appointing conveyancers to speed up the issuing of title deeds, which is currently the responsibility of municipalities. Unfortunately, it has not yielded the desired results.
A beneficiary administration unit has been established to manage all matters relating to beneficiaries, including, among other things, the deregistration and registration of beneficiaries for lodgment by conveyancers to the Deeds Office. The national department has dedicated 2013-14 to focus on issuing title deeds to our beneficiaries, and as the provincial department we will also prioritise this programme.
The provincial department has received accolades at the national Govan Mbeki Awards and our flagship projects continue to fly our flag high as a province. The Walmer Link Housing Project, a pilot project for the Finance- Linked Individual Subsidy Programme, has won the Best Finance-Linked Individual Subsidy Programme at the national Govan Mbeki Awards this month. We have to give recognition! [Applause.]
Our efforts in the informal settlements upgrading programme were also recognised and we won the best informal settlements upgrading programme in the country. One of our students also won the best students award out of many other students. So, we are indeed moving forward. I am convinced that we have overcome the prodigious challenges that stifled service delivery and compromised quality in the province over the years in the delivery of human settlements. We are making timely interventions, geared towards accelerating service delivery and improving the quality of our houses while unblocking systems that delay our progress. Hon members, we remain cognisant that the majority of our people's hopes and aspirations for a better life will be realised as our government delivers and continues to deliver on its mandate.
For us, the delivery of human settlements means that the end result of our work is an improvement in the quality of household life in its totality. We witnessed what such an improved quality of household life means when we handed over houses to elderly people who had been dispossessed of their property and land when Macleantown was declared a white group area in 1970, and in 2013 we handed out houses to this community.
It is incumbent on us to ensure that our programmes redress the consequences of the 1913 Natives Land Act; improve the quality of household life as enshrined in the objectives of Outcome 8; and address the triple challenge of poverty, unemployment and inequality. As a result, our contribution to achieve these, as a provincial department of human settlements, will be on our Finance- Linked Individual Subsidy Programme, Small Town Revitalisation Programme and the correct Beneficiary campaign, as well as the issuing of title deeds intended to confirm ownership of houses by our beneficiaries.
In conclusion, we are now in the electioneering period, when the plight and suffering of our people will be used by many unscrupulous people to garner votes and mislead them in the process. The plight of our people should not at any time be used for any other reason than for their own development. As a province, we are at the centre of people's development through human settlements development, which is pivotal to people's wellbeing. It is possible. [Applause.]