PORTFOLIO COMMITTEE ON PUBLIC SERVICE AND ADMINISTRATION

PORTFOLIO COMMITTEE ON PUBLIC SERVICE AND ADMINISTRATION
REPORT TO THE NATIONAL ASSEMBLY

VISIT TO ALEXANDRA URBAN RENEWAL PROJECT AND THE FREE STATE PROVINCE: JANUARY 2003

1. INTRODUCTION
As part of our Annual Programmme, 2003, the Portfolio Committee on Public Service and Administration visited the Alexandra Urban Renewal Project, the Free State Office of the Director-General, as well as the three Free State Departments, namely Agriculture, Home Affairs and Social Development, on the 21^st , 22^nd and 23^rd January 2003, respectively.

Whereas our visit can largely be explained as part of our routine oversight programme, the idea to visit the Alexandra Urban Renewal Project was due to what was alleged during our visit to the same project, in 2002, that there were serious problems associated with the implementation of the project. It was said then that the community was generally dissatisfied with the project, to the extent that they did not see what they were benefiting from it. It was due to this understanding and the desire to make a contribution towards finding a solution for the project that we decided to organise a panel and to allow community representatives to share their opinions regarding the project. The day was meant to belong to the people through their representatives, whereas the panel would listen to those people as they air their views and would later on develop a strategy to take those issues forward.

The Office of the Director-General in the Free State was requested to brief the Committee about the Province's Strategic Plans and the Organisational Structure, so as to enable the Committee to understand the state of readiness of that Province in dealing with issues of service delivery to the community. It was anticipated that dealing with the Organisational Structure of the Province at the level of the Director-General, would facilitate an interaction that, when we deal with the Provincial Departments, we would have enough time to engage them on key areas of service delivery rather than sing the Organogramme rhetoric as we visit one Department after the other.

The area of interest of the Committee with the Department of Agriculture was the role of the Department in creating conducive environment for emerging farmers, with a specific focus on assisting farmers from the previously disadvantaged communities. Noting that land acquisition and ownership has a direct impact on the success or otherwise of accelerating new entrance into the farming fraternity, and further noting that there are other Departments that have a direct responsibility in dealing with questions related to this, we requested that the Department of Agriculture be accompanied by the Department of Land as well as that of Local Government when they make their presentation.

The Department of Home Affairs was requested to brief us on their service delivery highlights and lowlights, wherein they had to put more emphasis on the issuing of Identity Documents, Birth and Death Certificates, residence and other permits, issuing of passports, and issues of migration and immigration. In dealing with these issues, the Department had to demonstrate to the Committee as to how accessible these services are to the members of the community and whether the Department conforms to the service standards for rendering such a service.

We asked the Department of Social Development to brief us on the situation in the Free State Province, as to how they deal with issues of the social security services, i.e old age pension payments, Child Support Grants, orphanage grants and other related services.

2. DELEGATION
The final delegation that participated in the Alexandra Urban Renewal Project comprised of the following members:

Mr M R Baloyi (ANC) (leading the delegation),
Mr J Mohlala (ANC),
Mr B Mthembu (ANC),
Ms L Maloney (ANC), and
Mr B Bell (DP).

In the Free State, the above delegation was joined by Dr U Roopnarain (I FP) and Ms Seeco (UCDP).

3. DEVELOPMENTS AT THE ALEXANDRA PROJECT
3.1 THE PANEL
We set up a Panel that was supposed to listen to what the people had to say about their experience as far as the Urban Renewal Project was progressing, and that comprised of the following:
- The National Assembly Portfolio Committee on Public Service and
Administration;
- Gauteng Provincial Legislature Standing Committee on Housing;
- Gauteng Provincial Legislature Standing Committee on Local Government and Development;
- The Project's Steering Committee;
- The Public Service Commission.

3.2. COMMUNITY REPRESENTATION AND PARTICIPATION
The community was represented by NGO's, Ward Committees, Ward Councilors, Political Organisations and other organs of civil society.

Facilitated by the Chairperson of the Gauteng Provincial Legislature Standing Committee on Housing, Cde Mabaso, the panel listened to the people speaking of their experience about the project, wherein they stood up one after another talking only about how well the project is turning their township around.

They are proud of the project, and they believe that the project is on course to achieve the objectives set during inception and that they stand to benefit at the end of the development

They cited shortcomings in the area of monitoring where they indicated that contractors are not closely monitored on site, with the end result being that those contractors take advantage of that to compromise quality during construction and to exploit the contract workers by way of underpaying them.

Whereas they believe that it is the community representatives responsibility to join the monitoring process and to do other community work like participating in the crime prevention initiatives, they recognized a resource burden where they have to do that in a manner that they have to find themselves having to spend money in order to meet their obligations, and they appealed that we should consider influencing a situation where such community representatives are entitled to an allowance.

The other problem they identified was that of the occupation of flats by foreigners who are not even legally supposed to be staying in those areas, and are actually contributing to the prevalence of crime in the area.

Before the community participated in the fashion as indicated above, the Department of Housing gave an input on the performance of the project, where they mentioned that, despite the fact that funding is not as forthcoming as they anticipated, particularly from the Head Office level, they are doing well with the implementation of the project. In this regard, our impression came from the following observations:
- The replacement of shacks with decent housing;
- The restoration of access to the township through the widening of the street;
- The restoration of access to the school, through the removal of shacks around that particular school. The upgrading of thirteen primary schools and five high schools is approximately 30% complete. Additional land is acquired for three new schools and design is underway for five new school.
- Improving sanitation in the township, as they distributed 58 000 bins to members of the community. A study has been completed for the establishment of a recycling station.
- The restoration of the Jukskei river, through the removal of refuse debris and the clearing of all unwanted materials from the river bank;
- The establishment of a multipurpose complex in the Central Business District of Alexandra. During the visit, the contractors were busy demolishing the old Railway buildings and removing all dumped properties that were otherwise polluting the area so as to make way for the complex that will be established as part of the Urban Renewal Project.
- The establishment of a transit village to accommodate households whose houses are under construction at a particular period of time. The Marlboro Transit village is upgraded and additional land acquired, whereas the Alexandra transit village, with 500 units has been handed over.
- The establishment of parks at the township:
- The establishment of a Police Station in the area comes as an important part of the project. The communication and interaction that arose from the project, and in particular when it came to a point of the establishment of this Station, created a conducive environment for the community to be involved in matters of safety and security. As a result of this, the project has yielded an actual drop of crime by 30% in the outskirts of the township.
- Cemetery upgrading is approximately 40% complete;
- About 2 500 trees have been planted as part of the greening project
- Contractors have been appointed for all water works for Frankenwald, Westlake, Marlboro and Linbro.
- About 907 Restitution claims have been settled.
- Approximately 1 200 households have been relocated and a voluntary relocation package introduced.
- 2 281 RDP housing units have been constructed at Braamfisherville and 200 units constructed at Alexandra Extension 8, whereas the concept and design work is completed for the conversion of hostel units into family units.

4. BRIEFING SESSION WITH THE DIRECTOR GENERAL OF FREE STATE PROVINCE
During the briefing session with the Director-General of the Free Sate Province, the following came to light:
- That the Province has a strategic plan called the Free State Development Plan, and that this plan is almost two years in operation.
- That the Province is experiencing a declining economic growth due to the mining operations that are on the decline. According to their strategic plan, they are aiming to turn the tide around and to get the economy growing by at least 4.5% by the end of the Financial Year.
- The first community bank was established for the Province and it has run into serious problems.
- The Child Support Grant uptake takes place at an increased pace.
- The province has managed to train 761 emerging farmers in terms of their farmer support programme.

The Development Plan encourages the practice of intersectional and intergovernmental coordination in that the plans of each section is related to the main plan. Accordingly, the Province established a coordination structure called PROVLOC, which is used as a vehicle to get the Provincial Government coordinating their activities with the Local Government. The PROVLOC technical team is the one that the Head of Department has to consult with the Municipal Managers in the Province, whereas the PROVLOC political is a forum through which the Premier consult with Mayors. In order to deal with the challenges of some schools performing to the level of expectation while others are dismally failing, the Province deployed principals from the successful schools to monitor the activities of those principals from those schools that were failing to produce good quality Matric results.

The challenge that the Province has with their Development Plan is that of capacity to implement it, and they are working on it.

The realisation of service delivery objectives in the Province is attributed to the utilization of the cluster approach, and the fact that all Departments have appointed Chief Financial Officers.

5. BRIEFING SESSION WITH THE DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE: FREE STATE PROVINCE
During the briefing session with our delegation, the MEC for Agriculture alluded to the following;
- That the Department's strategic plan is based on the Free State Development Plan.
- That the programme of Land Reform for Agricultural Development is in progress, where currently there are 1 600 recipients.
- In dealing with the broader land redistribution programme, the Province experiences a situation where there are more willing sellers, which gives an opportunity for entrance into the farming environment by the emerging farmers from the previously disadvantaged communities. The Department introduced two campaigns to the established commercial farmers, called "Know your neighbour" and "Pick your neighbour" with the former encouraging them to know and understand either the farm workers or the people from villages around the form, and the latter encouraging them to work with those people either in the form of acquiring shares in the farms or establishing partnerships.
- The problem for those emerging farmers that would like to go the route of the Land Bank loan option is that of land ownership, because many of such people are those who are owning such land on the tenure system that is not always reliable, such as the Permission To-Occupy Route (PTO). This option applies to the areas under the control of Traditional leaders, and it does not in fact transfer ownership to the land user.

The Department could be able to do more than they are doing, if they were not experiencing budget cuts as it is the case now, and also if they did not have an anomally that 74% of their budget goes to personnel expenditure.

The Department did not utilize the money donated by the European Union for the support of small-scale farmers in the form of establishing community gardens, and they cited reasons of stringent rules as the main course, but when we engaged them on such, it became clear that it was a question of misunderstanding and lack of commitment on their part that the money was not spent. They, however, mentioned the fact that they are now ready and they have a programme for spending the money.

6. BRIEFING SESSION WITH THE DEPARTMENT OF HOME AFFAIRS: FREE STATE
The Department of Home Affairs submitted their report of performance in all their key performance areas, in a manner that gave an aggregate picture of their performance, and without breaking the figures down to be able to give us a picture of their performance against set standards. Although they could not relate to a particular figure, they argued that there is a backlog in terms of Identity Documents that have been applied for but have not yet been issued, and they blamed it on the complex operational process with their Head Office.

The Regional Office is handling cases of migration and immigration through four border posts.

Their service delivery points are coping with the workload.

With effect from April 2003, they will embark on a campaign to accelerate the issuing of Identity Documents, as a preparation for the 2004 National and Provincial elections.

Their success in dealing with their workload is, allegedly, not influenced by the convenience of their work environment, but by the fact that they are committed to work even under difficult circumstances, as reflected in the challenges in the areas of budget constraints, logistics and low morale, Two main problems were mentioned in dealing with logistics, one being lack of facilities at the border posts. According to the report, there is a need for the use of such facilities as photocopiers and fax machines, and these facilities are not there at the border posts. The impact is that they have to travel for longer distances to be able to access such services, and more often than not, they find themselves in a situation where they have to accept that they just cannot be able to stretch themselves beyond the limit. The second problem is that of their Bloemfontein service point, which is not compatible for use by members of the community when they come for such services as Identity Documents, Birth/Death Certificates, Marriage certificates, etc. The office is situated on the first floor of the building and ordinary people have to use the escalators to be able to arrive at the service desks. There are two lifts in the building, but they are overcrowded in the majority of time. They took the matter up with the Department of Public Works but up to now they are no changes. It is difficult for normal ordinary members of the community to use, but, it is worse with the disabled persons. We visited the building in question and interviewed the people who were there for assistance, as well as staff members. Those interviewed members of the community confirmed that the location of the building is an issue warranting attention. One staff member commented generally about the situation, as follows:
- That the building is not conducive to work in;
- That there are no ventilators in the building;
- That many people are collapsing in the building because of heat;
- That some people go back unattended because they are afraid of escalators;
- That the building is not identifiable as a Home Affairs outlet;
- That the public toilets are not blocked off from the frontline desks, with the result that the bad smell always disturbs the workers;
- That the doors of the staff toilets are facing the staff kitchen directly, with the smell there-from always disturbing the staff;
- That the Black employees of the Department are not allowed to work in some sections, such as the Data procession, Civic affairs, Personnel, Store-room.

- That the Regional Director never visit their Office.
- That there is a bad relationship between Management and one of the two recognized Trade Unions.

Another problem which has been shared with the Portfolio Committee was that of corruption at the border posts, with a specific focus on Lindela border posts, where they have taken a Departmental decision that they are no longer going to use the said border post.

7. BRIEFING WITH THE DEPARTMENT OF SOCIAL DEVELOPMENT: FREE STATE
In briefing the Portfolio Committee, the MEC for the Department of Social Development indicated that 98% of their budget is spent on social security.

A cumulative total of back-payment to old-aged pensioners amounted to R73 061 302, and that covered 109 615 beneficiaries.

The Department has a strategy to increase the uptake of the Child Support Grant in the Province.

The Department has embarked on a process of improving pension pay-out points, by facilitating the provision of shelter, toilets, water and security.

They identified a problem of underpayment for Social Workers, and the fact that that state of affairs make them to be vulnerable to outside recruitment and deprives the Department of these indispensable units. They have tried their best to address the question of incentives for these scarce skills, but they are always disappointed. A report by the Social Workers Council was written, wherein they were addressing the situation concerning the conditions of service of Social Workers, and where they came out with specific recommendations for the improvement of Social Workers' salaries. The Department of Social Development referred such a report to the Minister of the Public Service and Administration for her attention, but until during the visit, the Minister had not yet replied to the report.

Inspired by the successful operation of the "Stepping Stones" One-Stop Centre in Port Elizabeth, and committed to provide a child-friendly and rights-based service that adheres to the Minimum Standards for the Child and Youth Care System, the Department of Social Development entered into a partnership with the South African Police Services, the Department of Justice and the National Institute for Crime Prevention and Reintegration of Offenders, to establish a one-stop Child Justice Centre in Mangaung. The Centre started operating in May 2002, and it deals with children in conflict with the law, aged between 14 and 17, and being children who have committed less serious offences. The approach at this Centre is more of rehabilitation and reintegration and proceedings are conducive to the best interest of the juvenile and are conducted in an atmosphere of understanding, which allows the juveniles to participate therein, and can also express themselves freely, unlike in a rigid and intimidatory proceedings in the courts.

Since it started operating, the Centre has already been home for a few offenders, some of whom have already been reconciled with the Jaw.

In dealing with the HIV/AIDS campaign the Department has appointed an HIV-positive person, who is doing well in the campaign.

8. RECOMMENDATIONS
That Parliament notes the good progress in the roll-out of the Alexandra Urban Renewal Project.

That the Department of Local Government and the Alexandra Steering Committee ensure that the project is closely monitored.

That the Department of Home Affairs, Safety and Security, Local Government and Housing jointly deal with the issue of the occupation of flats by foreigners at RCA section in Alexandra.

The Department of Provincial and Local Government look into the question of providing financial assistance to enable Ward Committees to perform their tasks

That the Free State DG'S office investigate the nature of problems that confronted the first community bank that was established in the province

That the DC'S office determine a time-frame for building capacity to deal with their strategic plan and that they give us feedback on this issue by August 2003

There should be a strategic intervention to reverse the tendency that SMME's collapse at the same rate that they get established

That the Department of Agriculture (Free State) submit a detailed plan, with time-frames, in terms of which they intend spending the European Union funds, not later than 31 March 2003.

That the Department of Home Affairs provide necessary amenities like fax machines, computers, telephones and photocopiers to the border posts offices.

That the Home Affairs Bloemfontein service point be relocated to an area and facility, where it will be accessible to members of the community.

That the allegations of corruption at Lindela border post be referred to the Anti-corruption unit for further investigation.

That the Department of Home Affairs fill the vacancies as soon as it is convenient to do so.

That the Department of Social Development, in consultation with the Department of Public Service and Administration, look into rationalization with the intention to address the salary problems for Social Workers.

That the Department of Social Development (Free State) be commended for the establishment of the one stop child justice center in Mangaung.