DATE STATION TIME PROGRAMME DURATION
31/07 ETV 06h35 Morning Edition 8 mins
Presenter: The National Department of Housing has at last submitted that there is a lot to be done to accelerate service delivery, particularly housing for millions of South Africans. It promised to implement more strategies to achieve its goal. To hear in depth about these plans, National Department of Housing spokesperson Monwabisi Maclean joins us this morning. Monwabisi a very good morning to you.
Monwabisi MaClean – National Dept of Housing spokesperson: Good morning.
Presenter: The (unclear) meetings and meetings have been going on in the past week, what are the plans?
Monwabisi MaClean – National Dept of Housing spokesperson: The department has come up with a new policy, breaking new ground policy and the plans that are implemented now or the plans that we are talking about, talk to that policy. That policy is looking at how to fast track housing delivery, that policy is looking at how to integrate our communities, it is looking at how to bring poor people close to economic activity. It’s also looking at various, or a lot of issues around how to assist people with service delivery, how we can begin to see the eradication of squatter camps.
Presenter: But Monwabisi, how different is it from the initial strategy and plan and policy as well. The initial… you see we have learnt a lot from the past 10 years of our democracy and on the basis of the lessons that we’ve learnt we then sit back and say, where did we go wrong? How should we correct the mistakes that we’ ve done.
Presenter: Where did you go wrong?
Monwabisi MaClean – National Dept of Housing spokesperson: Initially the demand for housing was very high and what we then did was to focus on the quantity of housing, just delivering houses as quickly as possible. What we then did was to look at how we can deliver quality, how we can make sure that our people are not taken for a ride, how do we make sure that the houses that are being delivered are quality houses, how do we make sure that the houses that we deliver, are bigger houses, can accommodate people, can give people dignity, because we are talking about how to provide our people with the kind of dignity that they deserve. So what we’ve done is to also have projects, like your end to gateway project, like your Cosmocity project, where we said let us have these national projects, implement them, I would sign off the normal legal framework and look at how we can then, from the lessons we learn, from these projects implement a different policy on housing.
Presenter: Monwabisi, how are you going to strike a balance between the quality and the quantity, because there are protests going on because people are in, you know, they are tired of waiting for houses and at the same time there are those as you say you have delivered plenty (unclear) of poor quality, how are you going to strike that balance of trying to satisfy people who are impatient and want a roof over their heads, but want quality at the same time.
Monwabisi MaClean – National Dept of Housing spokesperson: Yes, this policy is doing just that, what we are doing is to say our people deserve quality and we need to accelerate our production, so what we then do is to make sure that as we provide the houses, we’ve got institutions that are going to focus and look at the quality and make sure that the houses adhere to that standards that we set, we’ve got the national homebuilders, NHPCR Homebuilders Institution which belongs to the Department of Housing that makes sure that all the projects which belongs to the Department of Housing that makes sure that all the projects that are under the department, are actually monitored and we make sure that that quality is adhered to. In terms of the numbers if you look at the past 3 years, we have actually delivered almost the same number of houses, that we delivered in the first ten years of our democracy and that says then we can only do better because all the funds that are allocated to the department are used up, we don’t return any unspent funding to treasury and we are actually we keep asking for more funding. Unfortunately you know Themba, when you budget, you can only deliver as per your budget, if you are allocated five to deliver five houses, you can only deliver for five houses. There are a number of competing demands for the poor people and housing is one of those competing demands in the country.
Presenter: Monwabisi, there is talk of the fact that especially we are dealing with the quality of houses, and also just even the quantity, how are you going to deal with the contractors, who cannot and there are reports that the government is looking at, now even, cutting off those BEE consortiums , or contractors that are not actually able to deliver and going for those long-standing contractors that came.
Monwabisi MaClean – National Dept of Housing spokesperson: Some of the c ontractors are already facing the law, some are in court for what they have done to the department and the deserving people in this country. What we are doing as well, in the social contract for accelerated housing delivery, we are bringing all the partners and we are bringing the big construction companies, that had left the construction industry for the Department, because the profit margin are so low, bureaucracy made it very difficult for them to actually begin to do and achieve what they needed to achieve. We are certainly addressing the bureaucracy, we are looking at ways at which there will be short turnover periods and the contractors are back. We are working very well through the social contract for accelerated delivery of houses.
Presenter: The President said over the weekend that communities must be patient, as part as service delivery, what is the time frame that you have come up with out of the meetings that you have, what are the challenges, how many houses do you have to deliver, when can people expect these houses to be ready, very quickly, I know it ’s a long question.
Monwabisi MaClean – National Dept of Housing spokesperson: We have always maintained that by 2014 we will have dealt with all the informal settlements in South Africa. We still continue to say that, what we are also saying is that people have got every right to be unhappy, delivery has not been what we had wanted it. It has been very slow, people have been very patiently waiting for us to deliver. We are still appealing to our people to be patient, because we have shown that we can deliver, in the past three years only.
Presenter: What is the challenge at the moment in terms of numbers, the houses you need to deliver?
Monwabisi MaClean – National Dept of Housing spokesperson: We need to deliver 2,2 million houses, and by 2014 we’ll have dealt with that number of houses.
Presenter: And what’s the nearest target that you have at the moment?
2014.
I am talking about this year, next year, how many houses will you have delivered?
Certianly we’ve got provinces, and provinces allocate as per demand, as per the budget, for those provineces, the only thing I can say is that nationally by 2014, we’ll have sorted out all the problems that we have had with the ….
By 2014 everyone will be housed?
Everyone will be housed, certainly, you heard it from Monwabisi Maclean, National Department of Housing spokesperson.
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