Gauteng Premier Panyaza Lesufi has vowed to roll out interventions for the benefit of the province’s poor and unemployed. Among others, Lesufi says his administration will be giving free school uniforms to children from poor households as well as food parcels.
The Premier made the commitment in Randburg on Saturday where he handed out over ten thousand appointment letters to new recruits who are beneficiaries of the provincial government’s Nasi spane mass employment programme.
Lesufi used the opportunity to hit back at opposition parties who claimed the sudden job creation initiative was meant to help the ANC retain power during next year’s national and provincial elections.
“We are accused by certain political parties that they can even go to court to push us to stop this program. We are saying go to court and waste your money.we will go to our communities and create jobs with that money and give young people opportunities.we are proud as this government that I have the honour to lead that as this government if the private sector is not ready to create jobs we will not fold our arms, every cent that we have we will make it available so that people can get jobs and work for their own families,” said Lesufi to laud applause from the thousands who turned up to receive their letters.
Lesufi is also busy with what is called “siya transformer” , a programme to fix damaged transformers across the province to ensure that communities that have been without electricity for months and even years have got power ahead of Christmas. He said his government will be adding a cherry on top in the form of food parcels and school uniforms.
“Where your transformers were broken, stolen and vandalised, the government that I have the honour to lead is coming to each and every township that does not have electricity. We are fixing those transformers and you are going to have electricity back in your communities so that you can live and enjoy your Christmas.
“We are also giving you a chance to take your child in full uniform with books at the beginning of the year and take them to school,” he said.
Lesufi said his government will also be awarding bursaries to drug addicts currently living in the streets of Gauteng’s major cities as a way of curbing substance abuse. The Premier said the government is giving the addicts a second chance in life.
“This government that I have the honour to lead has bursaries for children that are suffering from nyaope to go back to school. This government that I have the honour to lead has a skills program to take nyaope children and train them so that they can work and stand on their own.
“MEC Mbali Hlophe, you have been given the right by this government to go and buy a building so that all those young people that are street kids in all the major cities are sleeping under the bridges. We are now sending you, fetching them, washing them, clothed them so that they can survive and get a second chance in life,” said the Premier.