End of the year, Christmas and New Year message Eastern Cape Premier, Noxolo Kiviet

'Celebrating a momentous 2011 and rolling the sleeves to do more in 2012.'

As most people are winding down their operations and gearing themselves to enjoy the festive holidays, it is important to reflect on how we have performed in 2011 to advance the cause of ensuring a better life for all in the province of Eastern Cape.

The year 2011 has been a momentous one for the people of the Eastern Cape with major strides made to improve people’s lives while challenges also remained daunting with a number of high profile incidents that may have dominated the national dialogue. I wish to share with you that the Provincial Government made a number of interventions to turn the tide in economy, education, health, crime and corruption, rural development and in building a real developmental state.

We concluded a number of strategic agreements that are set to create over 160 000 job opportunities to make a dent on the province’s 28% unemployment rate. These include:

• Umzimvubu Water Catchment Project to supply accelerated industrial and agricultural development with the Department of Water Affairs funding the feasibility study;
• Expansion of Ngqura container port to serve as trans-shipment hub with a rail link to Gauteng to supply manganese and other major containers;
• Construction of major roads like the N2 Wild Coast Toll Road and R72; as well as
• Rollout of the Presidential Intervention Project in the KSD Municipality.

These projects will add to strategic partnerships entered into with State Owned Entreprises like Eskom, SANRAL, Transnet and SAFCOL to expand our infrastructure and economic development with billions of rands committed for investment during the medium term expenditure framework. With that said, we will continue to invest funds through the ECDC for enterprise development. SMMEs, in our view remain a viable vehicle for job creation. In February 2012 we are hosting a job summit where our job strategy is expected to be sealed by also private sector and labour.

We have spared no effort also in seeking to turn around delivery of social services like Health and Education. As our focus is on ensuring improved quality of learning and teaching, we trained curriculum and subject advisors, early childhood development practitioners and teachers and set aside R97 million to roll-out the Educators’ Laptop initiative. We decentralised management and delivery of the nutrition programme to communities and indications are that this model is working very well. The provision of quality education in a conducive environment remains a basic right we want to deliver for our children.

The fact that the school infrastructure backlog amounts to R27 billion will not deter our efforts to provide our children with better learning facilities. We are therefore finalising infrastructure development tenders to the value of R270 million including replacement of mud schools.

We are intensifying interventions to improve delivery of health care services including the fight against HIV and AIDS with over 158 000 people on the anti-retroviral treatment by end of 2011, a 35% improvement in 2011 alone. We are scaling up efforts to reduce the burden of disease and to build appropriate health infrastructure to improve access with nearly R2 billion committed over the MTEF to improve nine hospitals in the Eastern Cape. It is indeed exciting to see construction happening uninterrupted at Cecelia Makhiwane Hospital in Mdantsane. Our people should look forward to a world class health care facility especially, with the National Health Insurance coming in soon.

To realise most of the ideals we have and the commitments made to improve people’s lives, the state must be sufficiently capacitated and poised to play its strategic role. We adopted a Public Sector Transformation Framework to improve the organisational culture, talent and people management which is currently being rolled out.

We have intensified efforts to improve corporate governance with a particular focus on fight against corruption and strengthening internal controls and the administration. We have adopted a new web-based fraud and corruption case management system that assists in capturing, tracking and analysing cases to enable prompt management interventions.

It is important to note that the number of cases in the provincial Fraud and Corruption Database is 423, with nearly half coming from Education and Health. It is against this challenge that the Special Investigating Unit is deployed to the Departments of Education and Health to address huge backlogs in anti-corruption cases. We also established multi-agency teams to assist the two Departments to address huge backlogs in anti-corruption cases.

Rural development is also receiving special attention with steady but sure progress being made to establish a Rural Development Agency to spearhead among others Wild Coast Development Initiative, farmer support and land care programme, food security initiatives and small town revitalisation programme.

As government we are committed to ensure the safety and security of our communities at all times. We are pleased to say that there is a downward trend in key categories of crime in the province. The crime statistics confirm that the tide against crime is turning and that police, working with civil society, are gaining an upper hand against vicious criminals. It is concerning though that even when the statistic show a decline of 26.1% in offences related to drinking and driving, we still continue to lose our loved ones in road accidents. We appeal to our motorists to exercise extreme caution on the roads this festive season, let’s rather arrive late than never in our destinations. There is a long way to go, however we are certain that working together with every stakeholder, we can do more to deliver a better life for all in 2012 and beyond.

In 2011 we have lost great sons and daughters of the soil, and I wish to acknowledge the untimely passing on of our great legal mind and champion of people’s human rights, a struggle veteran – Judge Fikile Bam. On behalf of the people of the Eastern Cape I wish to express our condolences to his family. Take solace from knowing that we share your grief. May his soul rest in peace.

May all those remaining at work to ensure safety, to save lives and to provide for the needs of all of us, be fortified to do so with excellence. We are greatful to you all.

Let’s make this period of goodwill and rest a memorable one that will enable us to return in 2012 with much vigour to build on our successes in 2012. To all of you, I wish you a happy Christmas and a prosperous New Year.

Fact Sheet

2011 End of the Year Report from Eastern Cape Premier Ms Noxolo Kiviet

Economy

• The foundation and cornerstone of the fight against poverty and inequality is the creation of decent work and transformation of the economy. The globally induced decline in economic growth rate from 4.8 % in the first quarter of 2011 to 1.4 % and the resultant increase in unemployment rate from 24% to 28.9% in the Eastern Cape pose a challenge to our efforts of ensuring a better life for all.
  
• However, we have developed plans and reached strategic agreements worth billions of rands that have begun to create jobs to meet our target of 162 000 decent work opportunities over the MTEF period. We will achieve this target by focusing on social economy, Extended Public Works Programme (EPWP), Cooperatives and SMMEs, Green economy and expanding economic and logistics infrastructure to create jobs.
  
• Planned Transnet capital projects will also create massive job opportunities. Over the short term, Transnet has committed to invest in projects with a combined value of more than R24 billion which include: Port of Ngqura berth expansion (R6.86 billion); cargo berth (R570 million); Liquid bulk terminal (R720 million); manganese export including rail and port development over 7 years (R11.2 billion); Transshipment hub including Gauteng rail corridor development (R2.35 billion); Port Elizabeth –Car Terminal expansion (R792 million) and East London Port – Extending harbor and deepening channel (R1.5 billion); as well as the Buffalo Bridge (R300 million).
  
• The Department of Water Affairs has budgeted to fund a feasibility study on the Mzimvubu Water Catchment project to the tune of R20 million in 2012. The dam is set to generate over 4 000 construction jobs with more direct and indirect job opportunities created during its operation.
  
• The N2 Wild Coast toll road has been designed and costed by SANRAL (R9 billion). Over 6000 jobs are anticipated. Both the N2 toll road and Mzimvubu catchment projects are reflected in the draft long-range National strategic plan called Vision 2030 released by the National Planning Commission (NPC) in November 2011.
  
• Over the next six years Eskom plans to roll out capital projects which amount to R10 billion and include increased transfer of power to Nelson Mandela and Buffalo City Metros as well as further rollout of energy provision to rural areas. Safcol has an established presence in the Province through 17, 3 % ownership in Singisi Forest Products (valued at R104 million) and 16 % of Amathole Forestry company (valued at R3 million).
  
• The province has been able to develop 883 SMMEs and 472 of those were established this year.

Education

• Education is a means of promoting good citizenship as well as preparing our people for the needs of a modern economy and a democratic society. The Eastern Cape is ranked the second worst province in terms of education and literacy levels. Almost 20% of the entire illiterate population of the country resides in the Eastern Cape.
  
• To address this challenge and also to entrench the culture and quality of learning and teaching, we trained 21 000 Foundation Phase and 12 335 FET educators to be able to implement the Curriculum and Assessment Policy Statement (CAPS) 2012. An amount of R97 million was set aside for Educator’s Laptop initiative in the province to bridge the digital divide and mainstream information economy in our education system.
  
• The Provincial Government has implemented Norms and Standards for funding Grade R for the first time, and R30 million has been transferred to Quintile 1, 2 and 3 schools.
  
• We have reviewed the entire system of Learner Teacher Support Material (LTSM) provision and management, and a project team comprising DoE, publishers, and booksellers has been set up to address challenges. We are monitoring this to ensure delivery on time.
  
• The model for school nutrition in the Province has been fully decentralised and changed to transfer payments. This entails transferring funds to schools for them to fully manage the programme. Reports indicate that the change of model has been successful, despite major resistance from suppliers and some officials within the department. Over 1 692 643 learners are benefiting from the programme in a sustainable manner.
  
• Backlog in school infrastructure amounts to R27 billion. 400 temporary classrooms and 52 of the 144 storm –damaged schools were fixed this year. Infrastructure projects in excess of R270 million are in the process of adjudication and site handovers.
• The Department of Basic Education has put out a tender for the first 28 mud schools to be built under the Accelerated Schools Infrastructure Delivery Initiatives (ASIDI) programme and the tender for the next 22 mud structures will be advertised shortly.
  
• Work is also underway to provide 161 schools, 94 schools and 104 schools respectively with sanitation, water and electricity.

Transport

• Efforts to revitalise two underutilised Airports took a new turn with Santaco Airlines landing at Bhisho Airport from Lanseria Airport in Gauteng. The R55 million Mthatha Airport upgrade is also underway, and flights between these strategic economic centres have become necessary to facilitate movement of people and goods.

Health

• One of the priorities of government is to improve access to quality health care and upscale the provision of services to all citizens of the Province. This necessitates key interventions such as improving the quality of care, public facilities, boosting our human resourcing, stepping up fight against HIV and AIDS and generally reducing the burden of diseases.
  
• The percentage of pregnant women infected with HIV in the Eastern Cape is increasing. The prevalence trend is 28.1 % and Nelson Mandela Bay Metro had the highest prevalence at 30.7 % followed by OR Tambo District with 29.8 %. Through the “Saving Mothers Saving Babies” project we have seen the number of maternal deaths in facilities decreasing to 105, compared to 269 at the end of the 2009/10 financial year.
  
• The Department of Health is working on increasing the percentage of mothers and babies who receive post-natal care. There are currently 708 facilities in the province which are competent to provide ART. The total number of patients (including children and adults) on ART is 158 054 (compared to 102 186 in 2009).
  
• Some of the major health infrastructure projects committed over the MTEF period are: Cecilia Makhiwane (R950 million); Frere Hospital Oncology (R160 million); Livingstone Hospital (R60 million); St Patrick Hospital Casualty (R370 million); St Elizabeth Hospital (R60 million); Frontier Hospital upgrading of wards and new mortuary (R152 million); Jose Pearson XDR TB Hospital (R13.5 million); Nkqubela Hospital MDR TB Wards (R7.5 million) and Machinery and Equipment in Dr Mphehle, St Elizabeth, St Patricks and Frontier Hospitals (R35.2 million).

Good Governance

• The world is still reeling from a terrible economic crisis which was a result of essentially fraud and corruption that manifested in developed economies with devastating consequences on poor and developing nations. Evidence show that corruption hurts poor people disproportionately. Government is committed to eliminate corruption in the public service, while leading a national movement to clean our society. The number of cases in the provincial Fraud and Corruption Database is 423. Education with 111and 96 cases respectively.