The state of the city outlined
Joburg meyer focuses on democratising the economy and access to services during State of the City Address.
“We celebrate a Soweto of 2016 which boasts tarred roads, a world class theatre, extensive public transport networks, and some of the City’s best parks and retail, tourism and entertainment centres.” Johannesburg mayor Parks Tau made these remarks on Wednesday when he was delivering his 2016 State of the city Address.
The mayor’s speech was centred around the theme of democratising access to the economy and basic services for the residents of the city. Access to basic services such as housing, electricity and water are seen by the meyer as vital in democratising the city’s economy while improving it as the same time.
About 70 000 new housing units have since been developed through various housing projects as part of democratising access to shelter. Informal settlements have not been left out in this project as many of them now have access to electricity and water.
“It is therefore encouraging to note that we have formalised nearly 29 000 informal sector homes where they stood, and relocated over 600 other households to linked housing projects,” said Tau.
The project to formalise informal dwelling is being extended to backyard shacks which are often attached to formal dwellings in the townships. The meyer said, “We are working with a range of partners to support upgrading these backyard informal dwellings to new kinds of formal dwelling, based on designs submitted to an open competition we ran last year. This represents an informal sector providing over 350 000 households with rental accommodation.”
The move to formalise this sector is important in improving the city’s economy as part of vision 2040. Even though the city’s economy has grown to double the size of what it was in 20 years ago, economic freedom is still not a reality for many.
Besides housing and basic services, Tau’s speech dwelled a lot on the city’s plan to include the youth as active participants in the economy. These plans include ups killing young people and creating enabling environments for them to enter the job market.
“Last year we announced a far-sighted partnership with the Harambee youth employment accelerator, known as the Vulindlel’ eJozi programme.
“We are pleased to announce that this programme has already registered over 127 000 young people, of the targeted 200 000 announced last year,” said Tau.
Programmes like Vulindlel’ ejozi not only provide employment opportunities for the youth but they help the with their matric rewrite as well.
The Meyer could not end his speech without touching on the labour issues which have engulfed the city’s waste management service entity Pikitup in the recent past. He said, “We unreservedly condemn the violence, disruption of services and destruction of property that sometimes accompanies unprotected strikes.
“This nation has developed a progressive labour relations framework to regulate the labour market and resolve disputes between workers and employers.”
