The ANC in the Legislature believes rushing and pushing the Medium-Term Budget Policy Statement and 2021 Municipal Review and Outlook (MERO) through the Western Cape Parliament is a deliberate attempt to escape scrutiny and makes a mockery of the DA’s professed commitment to clean and open government. 

These Budget adjustments are removed from the material conditions of the most vulnerable Western Cape citizens as exposed by the recent LGE2021. This Budget can be described as a “No” Budget. There are no plans to create jobs, no plans to transform the ownership of the provincial economy, no plans to support small and medium enterprises. There are no plans to build the township economy. No plans to support land redistribution. 

In ramming this tabling through the House, the DA also tried to steal some of the ANC national government’s initiatives and dolly it up as theirs.  Western Cape Provincial Minister of Finance and Economic Opportunities, MEC David Maynier, talks about a provincial social wage and blatantly claims credit for the social welfare net that the national government has created to protect and support poor people. This is the same DA that vehemently opposed a minimum wage and anti-National Health Insurance.

In line with feeding on the ANC’s initiatives, the Budget wants to claim the very initiatives of youth unemployment which are funded from the Division of Revenue Bill, and chose to reject the 2021 allocation of R11 billion set aside for the Presidential Employment Intervention which allocates to provinces R6 billion for the employment of education and general school assistants, and R350 million to employ staff and assistant nurses in the health sector. In addition, R120 million has been allocated to the Department of Social Development to address graduate unemployment by appointing social workers, while R178 million from this intervention is unemployment risk support for Early Childhood Development related workers.

MEC Maynier has budgeted R2.2 billion over the medium term for more law enforcement officers and to support families at risk as well as other safety initiatives. Details are a bit sketchy as it is not clear how much will be spent on the already failing Safety Plan. Until now, the provincial government has failed to recruit, train and deploy the originally targeted 1000 boots on the ground, and by budgeting for more law enforcement officers it is not clear if this will be additional boots on the ground.  The ANC views on the Safety Plan are that it is not addressing the causal factors of violent crimes and that the DA seems to repeat its past mistakes which rendered the Safety Plan to be ineffective.

MEC Maynier also mentions that the province has reprioritized and allocated an additional R211.3 million to fight the Covid-19 pandemic and ring-fenced R800 million in the provincial reserves to support the fight against Covid-19. There are no details that have been given regarding the expenditure of funds that were earmarked for the Western Cape Government’s vaccine roll-out programme. As we witness a Covid-19 resurgence in the Western Cape, the government should immediately free these funds and invest it into humanitarian relief.

His plans to give R26 billion to infrastructure is puzzling and without substance. He does not say if this includes fixing crumbling infrastructure, sewage and roads in working class communities that have been at the receiving end of deliberate DA neglect. He must ask his DA Mayor of Cape Town to direct him to the sewerage system collapse on the Cape Flats, a collapse that has even discouraged developers and also systematically kept these communities and households down.

Maynier’s swipe at national government because of the manner that the discovery of the Omicron variant was communicated is boorish and childish and reminiscent of the DA tone exemplified by that party’s national leader. 

Shortly after 10am today in the Legislature, Maynier tabled the MTBPS and MERO thereby beginning a DA-created frenetic period that will see committees meeting tomorrow to discuss a dense document and debate Maynier’s plans on Wednesday.

On Thursday, there will be a second reading of the MBPS and on Friday the House will vote.

“This is unacceptable and is part of a DA tactic to circumvent accountability and not give members enough time to read, reflect consider and discuss economic matters that will have a profound effect on the province. The DA’s hypocrisy has no limits. Often they oppose government initiatives on the grounds of insufficient public participation. So theirs is cheap politicking rather than meaningfully building the South African state.”

We will not shirk our responsibilities, nor shy away from stopping this provincial government from doing as it pleases as if it has become a law unto itself.

 

Issued by the ANC Shadow MEC for Finance and Economic Development