Department of Public Works Budget 2010/11: input by National Association for Youth Empowerment in Construction

Meeting report

Presentation by the National Association for Youth Empowerment in Construction (NAYEC)
Mr Patrick Jabulani Msibi, Chief Executive Director: National Association for Youth Empowerment in Construction (NAYEC) introduced his organisation and gave its overview of the Department’s Budget vote. NAYEC was a Youth Civil Society Organisation in the non-profit sector. It was registered with the Department of Social Development under the Non-profit Organisations (NPO) Act of 1997. It had already signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with the Construction Education and Training Authority(CETA) and was working on completing a similar agreement with the Council for the Built Environment (CBE). The Construction Industry Development Board (CIDB) had also expressed an interest in working with NAYEC to empower and develop young people. NAYEC wanted to be seen as a partner with a key role to play in alleviating the skills shortage and bringing about transformation in the construction sector. The lack of skills within the construction sector in South Africa was evident in the construction of the stadiums for the FIFA 2010 World Cup Tournament. The organisation intended to create an environment where young people could be developed for the built environment profession, skills development for youth out of school and empowerment of young entrepreneurs.

NAYEC sought to represent the ‘young voice’ in the construction industry, by assisting with skills development; project management; getting the youth involved in construction projects; sourcing contracts and subcontracts for youth-owned firms; getting the youth represented in decision-making bodies; creating a platform for networking and opportunities to share industry information.

Mr Msibi spoke about the Vote 6 Public Works Budget. He said that Public Work’s aim was to provide for and manage the accommodation housing, land and infrastructure of National Departments. The Department led and directed the implementation of the national expanded Public Works programme to promote growth, job creation and transformation. He wanted to know why organisations such as CIDB had to pay rent every year for offices, could the Department not provide offices for such organisations, which would save them money.

Mr Msibi told the Committee about his brother who achieved an A in Mathematics and a B in Science at school, but got involved with a wrong company and committed a crime and ended up in prison for 15 years. He wanted to prevent this happening to other young people. A prison sentence would deprive them of the opportunity to develop their skills and it was a waste of their potential.

It was the Department’s role to provide for and manage housing, land and infrastructure programmes countrywide. The Department led and directed the implementation of the expanded national public works programme to promote growth, job creation and transformation. Mr Msibi wanted to know why organisations such as the CBE, CETA and CIDB had to pay a rental for offices. Why could permanent structures be found for these organisations?

With reference to the Department’s goals and objectives specifically for the youth, it had been announced that the Department would train 6000 youths in artisan trades by 2014. NAYEC said this was not enough; the number was small in relation to the amount of time. Mr Msibi asked if this was because of insufficient funds. The Department had also undertaken to facilitate the exit of the youth trained through the National Youth Services programme by ensuring that at least 15% of them were placed annually. NAYEC said this did not help.

NAYEC proposed the establishment of a task team with its own budget and mandate, under the leadership of the National Youth Development Agency (NYDA) and NAYEC. The task team should be given the role of creating an environment where it could participate meaningfully. NAYEC needed political buy-ins and it felt that the Committee should lead the process. The Department should allocate enough money for youth skills development, career development and entrepreneurship. The construction sector needed to focus on sustainability and young people should be seen as a tool for the sustainability of the sector. Although the youth were being trained in South Africa, the problem was that the country lost these skilled youths to other countries, such as the United Kingdom.

Discussion
The Chairperson wanted to know about NAYEC’s structure, he felt that the Committee did not have enough information about the organisation. He wanted to know if the organisation had been implemented in all provinces, what its budget was, how many members it had, how it had acquired those members and who was funding the organisation.

Mr Msibi explained that NAYEC was a national structure and had one office in Pretoria. The organisation did not have any funding at present but had approached potential funders. NAYEC had been started seven months previously and at present only had members based in Soweto, where it had done a pilot project to introduce the organisation to the youth in the area. 

Mr C Kekana (ANC) said he wished all young people had Mr Msibi’s spirit were given support to implement their vision to develop this country. However, a lot of work remained to be done. Structure was very important, especially if the organisation wanted people to fund it. Any potential donors would want to know how the organisation was being run and who was controlling the money. The organisation needed to prove that it was credible and that it was benefiting the youth and their development. NAYEC needed to compile a budget. Mr Msibi had to stop focusing on ideas and should rather work on the structure of the organisation. He suggested that Mr Msibi have a chat with the Chairperson of the Portfolio Committee on Correctional Services, because those youths in prison were not wasting their potential: there were development programmemes in prisons and his brother would have the opportunity of studying.

Mr M Manana (ANC) said that NAYEC should work together with other youth development agencies. Agencies such as the National Youth Development Agency (NYDA) had large mandates and the organisation could benefit by partnering with them and using their municipal bases around the country. It would be good if NAYEC and the NYDA met every few months. One approach NAYEC could suggest was that with every contract given out there had to be a youth-owned firm involved. NAYEC had to go out and encourage the youth to take advantage of training programmes because at the moment it was mostly women responding. Young people did not want to spend time training. They wanted to make money quickly, and so they were looking for any ‘get-rich-quick’ scheme. The youth had to be taught how to move up gradually in a career, learning the proper skills as they went along.

Mr Msibi said that NAYEC did have a structure in place. The organisation had a board of trustees with very capable people sitting on the board. It had documents and a business plan for the next three years. Within the next two months NAYEC would be establishing itself around the country provided they get the support from the CB), CETA and others when it came to resources allocation to NAYEC. The youth were not enlisting in training schemes and were going after ‘get-rich-quick’ rackets because they had poor role models, who had become rich quickly through corruption. NAYEC was in the process of partnering with other youth development agencies.

Mr T Magama (ANC) focused on the proposals NAYEC had made. NAYEC had asked that a task team be set up, but he wanted to know whether objectives would be attained by the creation of new structures or by getting current structures to operate more efficiently. What would the task team do, and why would it need a budget?  How did NAYEC link in with the existing structures? Advocacy had to be looked at. Objectives had to be realistic in terms of current mandates. There were already organisations doing this kind of work, and creating yet another entity would not help. NAYEC sought a role where it could create an environment: what type of role did the organisation envisage for itself, and what type of environment was being referred to? On the topic of allocating enough money to youth programmes, Mr Magama said this had always been a priority and a point of focus for the Committee. NAYEC was asking for new funds when funds were already being allocated. Throwing money at a problem did not solve it. The Committee had noted the things NAYEC had said, but the issues needed to be looked at in more depth.

Mr Msibi said the task team would deal with issues within the sector, like the ones he had mentioned. Public Works was already doing so much, and by introducing the task team it could delegate some of its responsibilities. The task team would involve all stakeholders in the programme and would help develop the youth. Together they could transform the construction sector. He had never heard of any municipality of the Department of Public Works calling a conference with youth development as its focus. This structure should be in place and youth-owned firms should be given a piece of construction projects. The task team would help with youth development and make sure that funds were being allocated in those areas.

Mr S Masango (DA) asked where Mr Msibi saw a gap for this type of organisation and why he had thought of this. The organisation was still young. He said that he was very pro rural and he wanted to know how NAYEC was going to get to the youth in the rural areas.

Mr Msibi replied that the organisation’s partnership with CETA would focus on going out to the rural areas, to develop the youth there and make sure that they had an opportunity to participate. In terms of the background of the organisation and the gap in the market, he said he had encountered problems in the construction sector. He had approached construction companies about his plan and the problems he had encountered but no one would take him seriously. There was no strategy vis-à-vis the youth in the construction sector. He had engaged people who were working in the sector, had asked questions and done some research. Through this he had set up the organisation and the structure. Soweto was a test area, and research was being done on how people responded to the organisation.

The Chairperson reminded Mr Msibi that job creation for the youth in the construction sector was difficult, especially when there were older more experience people in the sector who were also struggling to find work.

Mr P Mnguni (COPE) asked if the NYDA did not already have such a programme. He noted that NYDA was implementing a programme which was then implemented by the Umbosobomvu Youth Fund under the banner National Youth Service specifically youth build which is to different from NAYEC’s programmes. CETA made use of external trainers for skills development and NAYEC would have to do the same, so what made it different from CETA?

Mr Msibi said that the other youth development agencies did not have programme similar to NAYEC. Those agencies focused on other areas of youth development. The memorandum signed meant that it would work in partnership with CETA. He said that in terms of getting the youth to respond to the programme they would need to go door to door and get the youth interested. NAYEC was also going to construction companies and asking for contracts for the youth. The difference between NAYEC and CETA was that CETA did not have people it could facilitate but NAYEC did. He said the organisation needed support so that it could get its programmes started.

The Chairperson asked that NAYEC send the Committee a profile of its board of trustees showing who they were and what each of them did, and also a proper business plan and structure,

The meeting was adjourned.