Department of Labour engage stakeholders on ways to create job opportunities in the Rustenburg area.
The Department of Labour in partnership with the Rustenburg Local Municipality today held a breakfast engagement session with stakeholders aimed at addressing employment challenges in the region. They engaged representatives from different sectors that makeup the economy of the Rustenburg region.
This engagement was aimed at coming up with ideas that can be followed in order to create job opportunities in the area and also develop the economy.
Speaking at the event the Director General, Mr Thobile Lamati, indicated that the Department has among others a mammoth task of creating a conducive environment for economic growth as it believed that a conducive environment is a catalyst for job creation.
Mr Lamati went further to say that as much as the Department is responsible for creating all this, it needed the support and buy-in of the business sector as they are the ones who have the resources that can be used to achieve the purpose of this engagement.
Speaking on behalf of the Rustenburg Local Municipality Mayor, Councillor John Molubi gave a brief background of how Rustenburg is doing economically. Molubi urged government to speed up and decisively enhance implementation of the nine-point-plan across all three spheres of government in order to get the economy out of a low growth trap.
Molubi indicated that they have went further in engaging all mining houses in the area and developed the 2040 Rustenburg Master Plan that seeks to address the issue of abandoned towns post mining activities.
“We anticipated that Rustenburg will at some point stop becoming a mining town, similarly to what Johannesburg experienced. Johannesburg is now no longer a mining city but has become the commercial hub of South Africa and that is what we want to see in Rustenburg,” said councillor Molubi.
Productivity South Africa, Mining Council of South Africa and the Mining Qualifications Authority were also invited and committed themselves to continuing working with the Department to ensure that this objective is achieved.
This engagement will be followed by delivery of a package of the Department of Labour services to communities in partnership with other government departments within the province on Saturday 25 August 2018. On the day the Department will be wrapping up the activities that started two weeks ago where different areas were visited in the Bojanala District Municipality and services offered.
For more information contact:
Botsang Huma
Cell: 082 497 7438
