Premier Lazarus Kagiso Mokgosi: North West EXCO Media Briefing

Members of the Executive Council present here today, 
The Director General,
Heads of Departments, 
Executive and Senior Management, 
Members of the Media gathered here today, 

Bagaetsho dumelang, I welcome you to this first quarter EXCO media briefing for 2025. The month of April 2025 marks the beginning of the first full financial year of the 7th administration following the completion of the 2024/2025 Financial Year half of which fell under the 6 th administration. We are happy that we have ended the 2024/25 Financial Year on a high note, having laid a firm administrative foundation to launch the Programme of Action of the 7th administration under the newly adopted Medium Term Development Plan (MTDP) centered on three strategic focus areas: 

• To drive inclusive growth and job creation
• To reduce poverty and tackle the high cost of living
• To build a capable, ethical and developmental state 

The implementation of the MTDP will be outlined during the tabling of departmental budgets in the upcoming months. The North West Provincial Government is in a better shape than ever before with all governance and service delivery structures in place and functioning at optimum levels. The Executive Council has not missed a single of its meetings since the inception of the 7th administration and all EXCO Clusters meetings have been held as scheduled, supported by Technical Clusters of Heads of Departments under the leadership of the Director General. All Committees supporting and advising the Premier to exercise his constitutional role as Head of Government are in place and meeting regularly.

This includes the Premier’s Economic & Investment Advisory Council, Infrastructure Coordinating Council, Premier’s Political Oversight Committee on municipalities and the Shareholders Political Committee on State Owned Entities. In the next two months, all Provincial Government Departments will have substantive Heads of Departments after conclusion of recruitment processes for the remaining vacant posts. We have improved coordination and cooperation with local government through the North West Premier’s Coordinating Council with Executive Mayors and Mayors of municipalities. 

The work of this intergovernmental structure is yielding desired results as captured in the MFMA improved audit outcomes as reported by the Auditor General. All municipalities submitted their 2023/24 Annual Financial Statements and were subjected to the audit, resulting in three (3) unqualified audit opinions, thirteen (13) qualified audit, three (3) adverse and three (3) disclaimers. This indicates an improvement from the previous financial years with disclaimers being reduced from nine (9) to three (3). 

As government we are fully committed to assist all municipalities with good governance practices that would ensure that we do away with adverse and disclaimers audit outcomes and we convert from unqualified to clean audits. Furthermore, we have deployed experts in town planning, engineering, finance and ICT in various fields as part of the local government turn-around strategy and to assist municipalities with skills transfer. 

The Ditsobotla Local Municipality, continues to receive support in terms of Section 139 (5) (a) and (c) of the Constitution read together with section 139 of the Municipal Finance Management Act (MFMA) albeit under difficult conditions. The municipality is also being supported in terms of Section 154 of the Constitution. A multi-disciplinary team comprising of officials from different government departments and other entities has been established to unblock service delivery challenges afflicting the municipality. 

We are moving Bokone-Bophirima Forward! Our Province will host no less than five (5) sector meetings of the G20 as part of the build up to South Africa’s hosting of the G20 Heads of State summit later in the year. This includes, the Women Empowerment Working Group, Energy Transition and Young Entrepreneurs Alliance Leadership Assembly among others. The opportunity to be awarded the right to host these meetings came at the right time to align with our already ongoing programme to build strategic infrastructure projects to support our tourism drive. We have invested twenty-five million rand in the refurbishment of the Pilanesberg Airport to support the booming tourist numbers in the Bojanala, Sun City and Pilanesberg nodal point. 

In addition, the road between Majakaneng and Sun City will be given a facelift of twenty-nine million rand. Discussions are underway between the provincial government and SANRAL to revamp an additional forty kilometers of this road in preparation of G20 activities. Moreover, the construction of Road D424 and Visser Street in Mahikeng has commenced. The major road works set at a budget of sixty-eight million rand will start from Lonely Park, passing through Embassy and Golf View all the way up to R49 intersection. We have resolved in our last EXCO sitting to appoint the Department of Public Works and Roads to spearhead the establishment of the North West Road Agency. The establishment of an agency dedicated to the road infrastructure will enable better management and maintenance of the provincial road network through innovative models and reforms.

 This will be achieved by building internal capacity of professionals and will strengthen the collaborative engagements with investors for the agency to mobilise finances to increase investment in road infrastructure.

The Provincial Government has set aside a budget of one hundred million rand to kick start the Growth Fund which will attract further collaboration with private sector to work together to deliver on strategic projects and fund initiatives that create jobs and grow the economy of the province. Colleagues, the foundation is laid and the North West Provincial Government service delivery machinery is moving ahead at great speed to radically transform government performance and delivery for the tenure of the current administration. 

This assertion is not only our boastful claims but has been confirmed by the Auditor General in the PFMA audit outcomes and in several meetings we have had with the AG since taking office. We are convinced that with the improvements in the audit outcomes at a provincial level, we can achieve clean audits for all provincial government departments by the end of the term of the 7th administration. We currently have two departments which are Provincial Treasury and Sports, Arts, Culture and Recreation with clean audits. 

This achievement is a product of our dedicated and focused monitoring and support to departments in the implementation of post audit action plans across departments. The Office of the Premier and Social Development should boast our numbers of clean audits soon. We have concluded the 2024/25 financial year with no new material audit concerns, recording a satisfactory expenditure levels of 99.2 %. The preliminary spending report which is still to be subjected to the audit indicates that of R54.3 billion adjusted budget, actual expenditure accounts for R53.8 billion. 

This improved performance will be sustained in the current fiscal year and it remains this government commitment that no funds would be returned to the national coffers as we have the responsibility to provide much needed services to our people through this utilization of limited resources. Moreover, the R421 million which was not utilized by the Departments will be rolled over to the new financial year and will be spent on projects already committed by government. 

Ladies and Gentlemen, at the beginning of the 7th administration, we dedicated this term of office to job creation in particular opportunities aimed at changing the lives of the youth. This commitment remains a driving inspiration behind government programme and all development initiatives. We are happy to announce that we have now launched the Labour Activation Programme (LAP) with the Department of Employment and Labour. 

Seven hundred million rand has been set aside to create more than twenty-seven thousand work opportunities for the youth. The Office of the Premier is working with the department for the full implementation of the programme through coordination with municipalities and provincial departments to ensure that these opportunities are distributed equitably across the four districts. The Extended Public Works Propgramme will spend an additional two hundred and thirty-four million to create ten thousand work opportunities. The Victor Sifora Bursary Scheme is in full swing and for the academic year 2025 ten million rand has been set aside. We intend to finalize the provincial bursary policy amendment to make provision for funding post graduate studies of select critical specialized skills demanded by the North West economy. 

The North West University is an important in the development of skills and capacity and the general improvement of service delivery in the province. The Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) between the North West University and North West Provincial Government will be signed in due course by the Premier and the Vice Chancellor to provide coordination of this strategic relationship for the next renewable period of five years. To this end we have successfully launched the Agri-Hub to drive innovation, research, and skills development in the agricultural sector. This initiative marks a significant milestone in the province’s ongoing efforts to enhance agricultural productivity, food security, and empowerment of local farmers. 

The province’s Innovation Hub which is a collaborative effort between government and the North West University has been successfully launched and it is primarily aimed at developing and nurturing the entrepreneurial skills of young people. Colleagues, we are also happy with the progress registered in the establishment of the NWU Medical School with the targeted date of first intake set for 2028. We recently held the World TB Day in Tshing Township in J.B Marks Local Municipality and we are happy with the progress registered in fighting this epidemic with our treatment success rate hovering at around eighty-five percent. 

While there are concerns that the halting of funding by the Trump administration in the United States of America could affect the TB Programme, I wish to indicate that the TB programme is funded through the Global Fund which is not affected by the US funding cuts. Currently, it is non-governmental organisations who are at the receiving end of this action and the National government is handling this matter. Colleagues, EXCO has approved the draft bill for the repeal of the outdated North West Housing Corporation Act and its replacement by the North West Human Settlements Act after all processes by the provincial legislature. The new legislation brings the mandate of the Housing Corporation in line with current legislative prescripts governing Human Settlements and clarifies mandates of both the entity and the department. 

Ladies and Gentlemen, we welcome the Pretoria High Court ruling on the removal of the Business Rescue Practitioner at the NTI. We believe that this ruling is a step in the right direction particularly in bringing about administrative stability in the entity. The provincial government has finalized evaluation processes for the appointment of a service provider for commuter bus services in Ngaka Modiri Molema and we can expect services to resume before end of this month. The Departments of Education and COSTMA recently appeared before the Human Rights Commission Inquiry in relation to challenges regarding Scholar Transport. 

As government we commit to cooperate with the commission to find lasting solutions to matters related to Scholar Transport. Colleagues, we are saddened by the news of the alleged two incidents of rape involving a seven-year-old girl in Ipelegeng towship in Mamusa Local Municipality as well as a frail elderly woman of Lekubu village in Ramotshere Moiloa Local Municipality. We call on law enforcement agencies to leave no stone unturned in their investigation as well as the swift arrest of the perpetrators of this heinous crimes. We commit to support every victim of Gender-Based Violence, and I will be visiting the two families to offer our support and get full details in relation to these incidents. 

In the last financial year over twenty-four million rand was allocated to sixteen NPOs which provides shelter and psychological support to the victims of GBV-F. Plans are already in motion to finalize the contracting of NPOs with the first payment tranche due to be paid in May. In the last financial year, we funded a total of three hundred and twenty-one NGOs at the tune of over two hundred and thirty-four million. Through Re Thuse Re go Thuse Flagship Programme, the Department of Social Development will intensify their efforts and rebrand services and prioritize services provided to communities by government. A full detailed plan of this initiative will be provided by the MEC during the budget speech. 

Ladies and Gentlemen, as announced during the State of the Province Address, we will be feeding two meals per day in more than one thousand three hundred quintile 1-3 primary and secondary schools. We have also allocated R1.4 billion for infrastructure development in the planning, construction and completion of schools in our province. Colleagues, we have completed three libraries namely at Dinokana, Wolmaranstad and Madibe- a- Makgabana. 

They will officially be opened and handed over to the communities during this quarter. In addition to this two Cultural Villages were completed in Matloding and Kudunkgwane. Our athletes are participating in the national swimming and athletics events taking place in Bloemfontein, Free State Province. We wish them well and we are confident that they will perform much better in this competition where they previously obtained an overall position four out of nine provinces. I wish to take this opportunity to thank you for being part of this briefing. We appreciate the role that you continue to play, firstly and most importantly as a conduit to facilitate communication between government and the people and secondly to hold us accountable. I thank you!

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