North West Premier, Bushy Maape, said in his maiden State of the Province Address (Sopa) on Friday that these jobs will be availed via the Expanded Public Works Programme. Maape lamented that these jobs won’t necessarily put a dent in the province’s 35,7% unemployment rate, but stresses it is a start.

Maape said they will, as a result, prioritise previously disadvantaged communities in the form of women, the disabled, and the youth, for these job opportunities.

He said he will resuscitate an accountability arm of his office to ensure that these infrastructure projects are not only started but end up completed. This arm is the Premier’s Infrastructure Coordinating Committee, which will assess the readiness of projects to be implemented. The committee will strengthen the hand of political heads of departments, to hold accounting officers managing infrastructure allocations accountable for failure to deliver on said projects, said Maape.

Some of the projects include the completion of new schools such as the Kgabalatsane Secondary School, Tlakgameng Secondary School, Tlokwe Secondary School, Tigane Secondary School (Phase2), Kagiso Barolong Secondary School, Monnamere Primary School, Kgetleng Secondary School, Mamodibo High School, and the Rekgonne Bapo Secondary School.

Others projects include “upgrading from gravel to surface standard roads from Gamokgatla to Uitkyk,  upgrading from gravel to surface standard (tar) roads from Modimong to Taung, special maintenance of the road in Wolmaransstad, special maintenance of sections of the road between Danville and Dada Motors through Mahikeng town, the rehabilitation of the road from Delareyville to Schweizer-Reneke; pothole patching in large sections of the road from the Schweizer Reneke border to Wolmaransstad, resealing of the road from Morokweng to Bona Bona, and repairing the Dr Beyers Naudé Road in the Lichtenburg industrial area,” explained the North West MEC.

OFM News/Olebogeng Motse and Olefile Vilakazi