Hon Minister, you further went on to say there were five main government programmes associated with jobs involving infrastructure building. Minster, the reality is that your satisfaction does not reflect what is happening on the ground. A lot of developing contractors are frustrated because of the grading system that does not do justice to their objectives.
The fourth project that you mentioned is the Vukuphile Learnership Programme, aimed at creating contractors and supervisors trained in labour- based methods. However, these poor people are not happy with the grading system that is being used against them.
It is on record that 482 000 jobs were created last year. However, by December almost a quarter of these people were home again as the jobs were not sustainable. Things can be turned around if we learn from our past mistakes and also admit where we went wrong. Let us get our team right and put people who are fit for purpose in positions instead of using the chopping and changing system that we have been using.
In the parliamentary villages some members are still using very old furniture, while others have new furniture. The alarm systems do not function. Each time a technician comes he complains about the department not authorising a budget for batteries to be purchased.
South Africa is a predominantly rural country, but in terms of development this is not reflected in rural areas unless there is migration from rural to urban areas. All that I am saying is let us take our rural communities on board. Your department has a rural development programme which seems to be there in name only. Our people are waiting with keen interest for these programmes to start unfolding.
There must be planned maintenance and emergency maintenance. I'm pleased that the department, for this financial year, has planned to do maintenance on 64 properties and hope this will reduce the backlog. The concern is that, as the committee, we are not informed of those properties so that we can do oversight.
Motswana a re "tau e e senang seboka e siiwa ke none e tlhotsa," ka jalo a re tshwarane ka diatla ka gore nt?wanyana e bonwa mabotobotong. Ke a leboga. [There is a Setswana saying that, "united we stand, divided we fall", therefore let us work together, because our intentions have been clear from the onset. Thank you.]