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It has taken a global economic meltdown to bring the ANC in
KwaZulu-Natal to the realisation that the province beset by high levels
of poverty and unprecedented fiscal overspending cannot afford to build
a new complex to house its provincial Legislature.

The new parliamentary complex, conceived by the previous ANC provincial
government, was to be the third available venue in KwaZulu-Natal to
house the Legislature after the Legislative Assembly buildings in Ulundi
and the historic Natal Parliament in Pietermaritzburg.

"The IFP, which has opposed the new parliamentary complex from the
outset as an extravagant diversion from more pressing challenges faced
by the province, welcomes the announcement by the KwaZulu-Natal MEC for
Finance Ina Cronje that the project has been effectively put on hold,"
said IFP MPL Roman Liptak who serves on the KwaZulu-Natal Legislature's
finance committee.

According to MEC Cronje, the provincial government will make a final
decision on the new parliamentary complex on 31 January 2010 but the
province's current multi-billion rand fiscal overexpenditure and the
government's all-out effort to arrest it suggest that the project will
be shelved.

"The finance committe, which was previously led to believe that the
venture was in the hands of the provincial Treasury, today discovered
that the new parliamentary complex has in fact been the Legislature's
own pet project, with senior Legislature staff in charge of bidding
procedures," said Liptak.

The project, which has so far cost the South African taxpayer
R7.1-million in its preliminary stages, could in the end have cost at
least R600-million which is the conservative estimate of the amount
spent on the new parliamentary complex in neighbouring Mpumalanga.

"The IFP welcomes the decision to rethink a project that would not have
benefited the poor who should be on the receiving end of government
largesse in KwaZulu-Natal. It is a pity that the ANC's change of heart
was not brought about by the genuine needs of the electorate but rather
by the province's fiscal crisis," said Liptak.