A lottery system which does away with corruption when issuing EPWP work has been praised by DA Gauteng premier candidate, Solly Msimanga.
Msimanga explained the system to EPWP workers and the media at the Centurion municipal offices on Thursday morning.
The EPWP system was designed to create temporary job opportunities for qualifying community members and offers a stipend in exchange for skills.
ALSO READ: Metro allocates millions to EPWP
“The new open lottery system, which is completely electronic, allocates a number to each employee,” said Msimanga.
“The system draws a number at random. If that number matches the one of the employee, he or she is allocated that specific work.”
The system does away with any interference from political affiliates or metro management, according to Msimanga.
“We have heard of instances whereby workers had to pay bribes and even sleep with officials for jobs. These are desperate job seekers who cannot afford to feed their families. Now they are expected to pay for jobs.”
Msimanga demonstrated the system to EPWP workers using a visual aid.
“We have already rolled out the system in Tshwane,” he said.
ALSO READ: Training EPWP workers to be money savvy
“Our goal is to ultimately roll out the system across the entire province and root out any corruption involved in the EPWP system. It will ensure all have fair access to jobs.”
During his recent State of the City address Tshwane mayor Stevens Mokgalapa said in 2016 the system was “one of the most horrendously run programmes”.
“An unpopular decision taken by this administration was to remove councillors from the running of the programme,” said Mokgalapa.
“Their interference was severely compromising the efficiency of the programme and beneficiary lists were constructed with political end goals in mind.”
Through the new lottery system Mokgalapa said the metro had no undue influence on who benefitted from the programme.
“Beneficiaries are selected according to their age, gender and ward. Their skill set is also considered when they are appointed, as certain jobs require baseline skills.”
WATCH:
Do you have more information about the story? Please send us an email to editorial@rekord.co.za or phone us on 083 625 4114.
For free breaking and community news, visit Rekord’s websites:
For more news and interesting articles, like Rekord on Facebook, follow us on Twitter or Instagram
