Question NW1980 to the Minister in the Presidency
28 October 2021 - NW1980
Powell, Ms EL to ask the Minister in the Presidency
Whether he will furnish Ms EL Powell with (a) copies of the contracts of all Public – Private Partnerships concluded, (b) details of any service providers contracted by the Government and (c) time frames for the completion of the 50 Startegic intergrated projects and 12 special projects that were gazetted in July 2020 that have been prioritized for the immediate implementation with all regulatory processes fast-tracked and enabling over R 340 billion in new investment which the President, Mr MC Ramaphosa, announced when he addressed Parliament on 15 October 2020?
Reply:
Public Private Partnerships (PPPs) are an important delivery mechanism to accelerate infrastructure investments into the country. As such, the National Treasury has the core responsibility to regulate PPPs in the country. The central legislation governing the PPPs for National and Provincial Government is Treasury Regulation 16 to the Public Finance Management Act, 1999 (PFMA).
Treasury Regulation 16.3.1 (a) is clear in its guidance that once a project is identified by an institution to be implemented as a PPP, the project has to be registered with the relevant Treasury. Thus, any infrastructure project registered with the Infrastructure and Investment Office, remains under the ownership or sponsorship of the relevant Department or Implementing Agent and not with the Presidency. SANRAL for example, is the Implementing Agent for all South Africa’s proclaimed National Road Network from National to Provincial and some selected regional routes, as applicable. SANRAL will thus be responsible for the necessary registration of possible PPP projects with National Treasury and the Department of Transport and will be responsible for the contractual arrangements as well.
Line function Departments, SOEs, Public Entities, Provincial Government Departments and Municipalities are responsible for managing procurement processes in line with the Public Finance and Management Act and Municipal Finance Management Act. The Presidency is not the custodian of information relating to the contracting of Service Providers for the infrastructure projects including Strategic Intergrated Projects.
With regard to the timeframes of the gazette projects of 24 July 2020 by the Department of Public Works and Infrastructure, it should be noted that all of these projects are at various stages within the infrastructure value chain of delivery. For example, a number a number of the Transport projects are completed, whilst a number of the Water and Sanitation projects, under SIP 19, are still in preparation stages. It is envisaged that projects in the preparation stages can take up to 36 months to reach conclusion of the relevant studies.
Great strides are being made with the SIP 20a, the Emergency/Risk Mitigation Power Purchase Procurement Programme (2000MW) where the preferred bidders are appointed and projects to be operational by mid-2022. While the DBSA only recently launched a Call for Proposals for SIP 20b, the Embedded Generation Investment Programme (EGIP), which opened on the 4th of August 2021 and will close 31st September 2021.
It is envisaged that the projects under the Social Housing Programme can be fully in construction within the next 18 months with 2 projects already reaching a completion rate of 65% to 70%, one social housing project completely refurbished and others to reach financial close within 12 months
The acceleration of those projects Gazetted on the 24th of July 2020 is being implemented in accordance with the Infrastructure Development Act, No. 23 of 2014 as amended where the Investment and Infrastructure office works closely with the relevant Departments in implementing Schedule 7 of the Act.
Thank you.