Western Cape Finance MEC should be told you can’t put lipstick on pigs.
Speaker,
Over the past year the Western Cape MEC for Finance has unveiled a “Budget to Bounce Back”, a Western Cape Recovery Plan to “Bounce Up”, and now a “Budget to Back You”.
Someone should tell the MEC that you can’t put lipstick on a pig.
He should take citizens into his confidence and explain some of the fine-print.
For example: Was it due to incompetence that the province failed to spend nearly R1 Billion set aside for infrastructure development in this period in which it claimed to be prioritising infrastructure development? It makes no sense.
Surely spending this money creating jobs in the construction sector, instead of returning it to the fiscus, would have had created greater bouncebackability?
The Western Cape government is not a PR agency. The people of the province can’t eat catchy phrases and breathless announcements. This is why they are hungry and unemployed. They rely on the actual nuts and bolts, on actual implementation.
A coherent 2021 adjustment budget – underpinned by truth and transparency – would reveal where the 2020 Bounce Back Budget and the 2021 Bounce Up Recovery Plan are having real impact, and seek to build on that momentum.
But these plans are incoherent.
The Recovery Plan commits government to fast-track infrastructure projects and address some of the fundamentals constraining economic growth and job creation. It promises to stimulate the economy by boosting infrastructure investment and job creation in the public sector.
But this adjustment budget surrenders R650 million intended to be spent on infrastructure before March 2022. The Transport and Public Works department has abandoned about R360 million for large roads and other building projects, while the Education department has abandoned R290 million originally allocated for Infrastructure Development.
On top of these R650m losses, the 2020 adjustment Budget saw the Transport & Public Works Department surrender R200 million from infrastructure projects and transfer R90 million from infrastructure projects, due to slow spending, to non-infrastructure items.
Speaker, that’s almost a R1 billion that this government has failed to spend on its infrastructure-driven growth plan in just one calendar year.
The MEC must explain the point of fancy budget speeches if he and his co-cheerleaders don’t have the skills to actually spend the money.
Media enquiries:
Brett Herron, GOOD: Secretary-General & Western Cape Provincial Parliament
Cell: 082 5183264
Email: bretth@forgood.org.za
Samkelo Mgobozi, GOOD: Media Manager
Cell: 0792315977 (whatsapp)/0829684021 (calls)
Email: samm@forgood.org.za