The National Education, Health and Allied Workers’ Union [NEHAWU] welcomes the resignation of Supra Mahumapelo as premier of the North West Province.  

The national union believes his resignation is long overdue and should have happened long ago. We hope the decision taken by Mr Mahumapelo to resign will accelerate the undoing of the plethora of challenges faced by the Provincial government of North West and the people of that province. His resignation presents an opportunity to rebuild and reposition the provincial government to be able to prioritise service delivery.

The people of the North West have been subjected to poor service delivery, our members have not been paid bonuses and worked in horrible conditions while greed and corruption was the order of the day. The health department and the provincial government collapsed under the nose of the former premier. Our strike at both the Department of Health and the Department of Social Development further exposed the extent of the rot in the departments and the provincial government.

NEHAWU has been in the forefront of calling for the resignation of the premier and his resignation is a victory for workers who were victims of outsourcing, corruption and unsafe working conditions. We hope the next premier will be a leader of integrity who will prioritise the people of the North West and bring betterment into their lives. Our members and workers including the people of the North West cannot continue to be let down by the very same people they put into power.

As NEHAWU, we hope that his resignation will not shield him from accounting from all the corruption allegations levelled against him. As part of the rebuilding process a thorough process of investigation will have to be undertaken to recoup some of the funds that the province has lost.

Currently, we are happy with the progress that has been registered by the Inter-Ministerial team in the province and we will continue to monitor it closely as per the agreement of the meeting between us and IMC, we will meet within two weeks to assess progress from the 17th May 2018.

Issued by NEHAWU