Questions and Replies

Reply:

1.

a) The verification process was conducted on the 8th -14th May 2022 in Lower Zingcuka. Out of the original list of 160 households /ODIs that was submitted as the families that were affected by the dispossession, the Commission has verified 154 households that have submitted the necessary documents and 6 households have not been verified.

The outstanding 6 families have outstanding documents which have not been submitted to the Commission, it is however alleged that the list of ODIs is not comprehensive and the Commission will not entertain the allegations without comprehensive documentation submitted as evidence.

The Commission has scheduled a follow up visit for 22 July 2022 for the second phase to collect documents from the 6 families and receive any other information and records from any other party alleging that they are part of the claim.

b) It is anticipated that the verification process will be completed by 30 August 2022 barring any challenges that emanate from the community concerned.

2. The claim is projected to be settled in Quarter 3 of 2022/23 Financial Year, on condition that the Commission receives full co-operation from the community in submitting all the required documentation.

END

Reply:

Melinda McKenzie was convicted of one (1) count of corruption, having contravened section 3(b)(iv) of the Prevention and Combatting of Corrupt Activities Act 12 of 2004 (PRECCA).

The Senior Public Prosecutor at the Germiston Regional Court advised that the accused changed legal representation after conviction. The new legal representative requested transcripts of the record, which on its own delayed the matter.

The new legal representative now intends bringing an application on 21 June 2022 for the reopening of the defence case after conviction.

This application will be opposed by the State because judgment has been given, and the accused has been convicted.

The only available avenue for the defence would be to appeal the conviction, if there are grounds to appeal.

Reply:

a) Vaalharts Cotton Workers Trust was established in 2004 and its workers became beneficiaries. The Vaalharts Katoen Produsente (Pty) Ltd (“the Company”) owns and operates the Cotton Gin in Hartswater town of Phokwane Local Municipality, Frances Baard District of the Northern Cape Province. The Company does not conduct any farming activities. The Company has two shareholders, namely Vaalharts Cotton (Pty) Ltd and the Vaalharts Cotton Permanent Workers Trust (“the Trust”). The ownership of the assets and shareholding in the Company was partly (49%) financed by the Industrial Development Corporation (IDC) in terms of a set of loan agreements. The payment of the IDC by the Company and the IDC’s requirements regarding shareholding of the Trust in the Company is well documented and the Trust has copies of the relevant documents as it was a signatory to the settlement agreements in terms of which the Company’s indebtedness to the IDC was settled (see attached copies).

b) The Department did not, in any form or manner, provide any funding or other assistance to the Company or its shareholders in acquiring and operating the Cotton Gin.

(c) (i),(ii) In view of the latter, Monitoring and Evaluation was not carried out since the contention from the company is that the Department had not provided any financial assistance during the acquisition process. However, workers have raised concerns with the Department, including the lack of participation in the operations of the company, power relations between management and worker-shareholders, skills transfer and labour relations, and tenure security. The Northern Cape Office of the Department has tried to mediate between management and workers.

Reply:

(1)(a) Zero.

(b) Not applicable.

(c) Not applicable.

(2) Not applicable.

(3) Not applicable.

STELLA NDABENI-ABRAHAMS

MINISTER: SMALL BUSINESS DEVELOPMENT

Reply:

The Department Agriculture, Land Reform and Rural Development (DALRRD) has drafted protocols to ensure that industry is able to export their poultry produce to a number of countries in Africa and to the Middle East from closed and bio secure facilities generally known as compartments. Compartments assist the poultry farmers to avoid introducing harmful poultry diseases in their farms. DALRRD continuously monitors these compartments.

Reply:

The steps are as follows:

Government’s comprehensive support to farmers:

The Department of Agriculture, Land Reform and Rural Development (DALRRD) is part of the multispectral committee that is coordinated by the Presidency to implement the National Food and Nutrition Security Plan (NFNSP). There are a number of interventions implemented under the NFNS Plan towards ensuring food and nutrition security. Efforts are being strengthened on an ongoing basis to increase greater access to support for all farmer categories. The Presidential Employment Stimulus (PES) continues towards to support subsistence producer with the aim of ensuring food production at household level. Under this initiative more than 66 000 subsistence producers have been supported to retain self-employment in the agricultural sector, thereby contributing to food security and economic growth. The PES is implemented amidst deliberate efforts that are also made to transform the agricultural sector and allow new players from historically disadvantaged backgrounds. The number of Extension Officers in the 44 districts across the nine provinces is being increased to strengthen extension and advisory services to farmers.

Intensifying agricultural production:

The DALRRD continues to support agricultural producers and increasing domestic food production through departmental programmes such as the Comprehensive Agricultural Support Programme (CASP) / Ilima-Letsema.

Land development and post settlement support:

The Land development and post settlement is implemented within the current budgetary constraints. The current policy and programmes are being strengthened to ensure an inclusive and holistic approach to support provided and maximise food production on available land.

Rural Development:

The Department’s Rural Development Mandate Outcome 6: Integrated and inclusive rural economy. The department is engaged with the finalisation of the Draft Integrated Rural Development Strategy, building on the lessons learnt from the implementation of Comprehensive Rural Development Programme (CRDP) and the Integrated Sustainable Rural Development Strategy (ISRDS). The department continues to play its role to Initiate, facilitate, coordinate and act as a catalyst for the implementation of a comprehensive rural development programme leading to sustainable and vibrant rural communities working closely with provincial and other national department through the District Development Model and Rural District Plans working with all national and provincial government departments and Traditional Councils.

The National Development Plan (NDP) (2012) identifies the following four key points relating to rural development: (i) Rural communities require greater social, economic, and political opportunities to overcome poverty; (ii) To achieve this, agricultural development should introduce a land reform and job-creation/livelihood strategy that ensures rural communities have jobs; (iii) Ensure quality access to basic services, health care, education, and food security; and (iii) plans for rural towns should be tailor-made according to the varying opportunities in each area. Intergovernmental relations should be addressed to improve rural governance.

The Department remains the driver of the Agri-Parks Programme that aims to uplift impoverished rural communities into the Agricultural value chain. The Department provides critical infrastructure such as fencing and irrigation to rural communities to assist them, with improving their production. These communities are linked into Farmer Production Support Units, which are constructed in rural areas to provide communities with agricultural support services. The Department continues to construct Farmer Production Support Units (FPSUs) that provide rural communities with a range of facilities such as mechanisation, pelleting machines for feed, silos to store grain, pack houses with refrigeration, access to state vets and training. Many of these services was in the past only reserved for commercial farmers in rural areas. This allows for rural communities to improve their production and enter the agricultural value chain with their small-scale produce and creates a sustainable path out of poverty. The current programmes through which the department executives its work includes:

• Socio-economic infrastructure projects to support Farmer Production Support Units (FPSUs), Animal and Veld Management Programme (AVMP) and River Valley Catalytic Programme (RVCP). This includes mechanization such as: fencing, animal handling facilities, stock water dams, boreholes, canals, dip tanks, pump houses, pack houses, irrigation pipes and schemes, silos and storage facilities and rural roads. The road infrastructure remains a high priority in national, provincial, municipal and farm roads to promote economic viability through safer, swift transport logistics of agricultural produce. As part of the implementation of the Comprehensive Rural Development Programme (CRDP) and Agriculture and Agro-processing Master Plan (AAMP), repair and rehabilitation of rural roads is critical to facilitate road logistics from farm to habour and to market. The Department is co-ordinating a Public-Private Partnership initiative which will include national, provincial and local governments as well as agricultural organisations;
• Development and Implementation of Skills development opportunities to rural youth through the National Rural Youth Services Corps (NARYSEC) which aims to build capacity of rural youth through various skills development interventions and working with public and private sector partners to facilitate the transitioning of recruited youth into economic activities; and
• Research of new innovative technologies, including Information and Communications Technology (ICT), and promote indigenous knowledge systems into rural communities to contributes towards improving the quality of lives of rural communities working in partnership and collaboration with institutions of higher learning, research agencies and technology agencies.

Reply:

a) As at 30 April 2022, the total number of permanently appointed magistrates, excluding temporary/acting magistrates and vacant posts, is as tabulated below:

Post Class	Number
Magistrate	1 257
Chief Magistrate	16
Regional Magistrate	326
Senior Magistrate	124
Regional Court President	8
Grand Total	1 731

b) In responding to this part of the question, it is important to draw the Honourable Member’s attention to section 13 of the Magistrates Act, 1990 (Act 90 of 1993), which provides that a magistrate shall vacate office when attaining the age of 65. This section was amended with effect from 1 December 2017, and a magistrate holding office may, before attaining the age of 65 years, in written notice to the Magistrates Commission, indicate his or her intention to continue to serve in such office for such further period specified in the written notice: Provided that a magistrate must vacate his or her office on attaining the age of 70 years.

The table below provides the number of magistrates who will reach retirement age within the next five (5) years (only permanently appointed magistrates):

(i) Per age group:

Row Labels	Count of Age
60	70
61	57
62	46
63	53
64	31
65	18
66	23
67	10
68	5
69	11
Grand Total	324

(ii) Per Post Class (permanently appointed magistrates between 60 and 69 years of age)

Post Class	Number
Magistrate	179
Chief Magistrate	10
Regional Magistrate	96
Senior Magistrate	35
Regional Court President	4
Grand Total	324

c) The latest information at our disposal in respect of funded posts for magistrates in the Republic is contained in the table below:

Post Class	Approved Posts
Special Grade Chief Magistrate	1
Chief Magistrate	21
Senior Magistrate	162
Magistrate	1 456
Regional Court President	10
Regional Magistrate	386
Grand Total	2 036

d) In terms of section 9(3) of the Magistrates’ Courts Act, 1944 (Act 32 of 1944), the Minister may appoint any appropriately qualified, fit and proper person as an acting magistrate after consultation with the Head of the Court concerned in any vacant Office of Magistrate. In practice, the Chief Magistrate or the Regional Court President will submit applications to the Deputy Minister, as the delegated authority by the Minister, for consideration of appointment of an acting Magistrate in the vacancies that still need to be filled. Acting magistrates are therefore appointed in all the vacant offices where applications are submitted by the Regional Court President or the Chief Magistrate in his or her area of jurisdiction. Acting Magistrates are also in posts where the incumbent Magistrate is acting in a higher position such as an acting Judge, acting Chief Magistrate or Senior Magistrate, etc, for appointment in posts where a Magistrate is on leave, for appointment where a Magistrate is suspended or in the funded case backlog courts. The acting appointments are generally made for a period of three (3) months at a time where-after the acting Magistrate may be re-appointed as the need exists. During the period of 1 April 2021 to 31 March 2022, the Deputy Minister appointed 2 251 acting Magistrates for the reasons mentioned above.

Reply:

a) 845.

b) To date the Department of Agriculture, Land Reform and Rural Development (DALRRD) has commissioned two independent studies on the Recapitalisation and Development Programme (RADP). In 2013 the Department of Monitoring and Evaluation (DPME) was requested to conduct a mid-term review and six provinces (Eastern Cape, Free State Gauteng, KwaZulu-Natal, Limpopo and North West) were selected and the outcomes were as follows, but not limited to these:

• The intervention seemed to have worked well in some provinces, whereas in others there were challenges. Overall 67% of the beneficiaries were effectively capacitated in the following areas:
• technical expertise 66%; farm management 71%;
• market output 88%;
• funding 76% and market input 62%; and
• in conclusion, it has been established that economic situation of farmers have improved significantly at about 72%.

c) Currently the intervention used to support farmers does not make use of strategic partners.

Reply:

The Minister of Small Business Development is aware of the effects of the rising costs of fuel to small enterprises. However, the Minister has not considered further mechanisms to cushion the blow that small enterprises may have felt beyond the government fuel levy relief declared by government. The Minister of Finance announced that the general fuel levy would be temporarily reduced by R1.50 per litre from 6 April 2022 until 31 May 2022. The date of April has since been reviewed to end in August 2022 to provide relief. I believe that the Ministers of Finance and of Mineral Resources and Energy are handling the matter related to fuel relief.

STELLA NDABENI-ABRAHAMS

MINISTER: SMALL BUSINESS DEVELOPMENT

Reply:

The Department of Agriculture, Land Reform and Rural Development (DALRRD) has developed an electronic export certification system which already enables all farmers to apply for the inspection of orchards and of goods to determine if they adhere to the importing countries standards and food safety requirements, completely electronically. The system went live in November 2019, is used by more than 3000 agricultural sector clients throughout the country, including farmers or companies that do not have computer systems. This system is used by farmers, traders, logistics companies, Food Business Operators, Pack houses, exporters.

The Western Cape Provincial Department of Agriculture is collaborating with the eCert system in the development of the Export control office System (ECOS) system which is an animal meat export system which will enable the export of meat products. The system was tested in the Western Cape on 15 November 2021. The Northern Cape is busy with testing and piloting the system to be possibly rolled out later this year. The system focuses on the value chain from the abattoir onwards for meat and on the dairy milking parlour onwards. The system will work with/integrate with the Livestock Traceability System for South Africa (LITSA).

DALRRD in collaboration with the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) is busy developing a LITSA system which will manage the movement and traceability of cattle initially and later on all animals. This system affects all animal farmers but in particular the Foot and Mouth Disease (FMD) affected provinces of South Africa and will help to manage the disease and facilitate trade in meat products once South Africa’s FMD free status has been re-instated. The system will integrate with the eCert System.

The Presidential Employment Stimulus Initiative has resulted in a system being developed that allowed rural farmers to get electronic vouchers which could be redeemed once they received their agricultural inputs from service providers. The survey 123 system also enables georeferencing of departmental projects.

The Western Cape and Free State Provincial Departments of Agriculture have been doing extensive research and development on the use of drones. The Free State is using them to manage stock theft. Western Cape mainly use them to monitor crops and apply precision arial spray, amongst others.

Reply:

(a),(b) Yes. The Department of Agriculture, Land Reform and Rural Development (DALRRD) is implementing various strategic initiatives catering for farmer support. These include the Farmer Production Support Units (FPSUs) as a rural smallholder farmer outreach and capacity building unit. FPSUs provide primary production inputs, mechanization support, extension services, storage facilities and training to producers. FPSU serves as a one-stop service centre for rural smallholder farmers within the catchment area of the FPSU.

Production infrastructure in a form of irrigation infrastructure, livestock handling facilities, storage facilities, livestock water systems and fencing are amongst those provided to enhance productivity of the farmers.

Through conditional grants in a form of Ilima/Letsema and Comprehensive Agricultural Support Programme, DALRRD also provide smallholder farmers with production support working closely with Provincial Departments of Agriculture. Land Development Support and Jobs fund initiative are the two other strategic interventions DALRRD is implementing targeting smallholder farmers.

Reply:

a) Since the start of the lock down as a result of the Covid-19 pandemic on 27 March 2020, the Department of Agriculture, Land Reform and Rural Development (DALRRD) implemented strategic projects to assist farmers inclusive of the following:

• The COVID 19 relief programme for smallholder producers;
• The Presidential Employment Stimulus for subsistence producers with a focus on women, youth people with disabilities and veterans;
• Working on the Blended Finance modalities and launching the industrial leg of the programme with the IDC;
• Intensely working with partners in implementation of the Jobs Fund Project with National Treasury;
• Continuous support through Programmes such as CASP and Ilima/ Letsema to focus on strategic impact of sustainability;
• The finalisation of the Agriculture and Agro-processing Master Plan (AAMP) with additional emphasis on increasing support for grains, red meat value chain, citrus and cotton; and
• Working with Provincial Departments of Agriculture to employ additional extension personnel who will support farmers with technical advisory services

b) The transformation of the agricultural sector is an ongoing process to include all black entrants across the subsistence, smallholder and commercial levels. Different transformation programmes target different farmer groups but with a focus for overall integration. The main effort being undertaken by DALRRD in relation to transformation is the Agriculture and Agro Processing Master Plan which is a social compact that aims to enhance existing and future transformation efforts.

Reply:

The Department appreciates the initiative taken by the Gauteng Department of Economic Development, Gauteng Enterprise Propeller in partnership with the Industrial Development Corporations for the purposes of setting up the Township Partnership Fund. However, the Department is however not in a position to request other state organs such as the provinces to adopt or implement the Fund since the provinces are operating independently.

The Department continues to engage with Provinces with the aim of ensuring uniformity in support for township and rural areas-based enterprises. The DSBD continues to support SMMEs through its own Township and Rural Entrepreneurship Programme (TREP), which is a Programme with a dedicated budget to assist small enterprises operating in underserved and unserved locations such as townships and rural areas.

To compliment the fund established by the Gauteng provincial government, the DSBD has adopted a Portfolio approach comprising of the DSBD, the Small Enterprise Development Agency (Seda) and the Small Enterprise Finance Agency (sefa) using an integrated approach for the support of SMMEs.

Both Seda and sefa have operational offices together with satellite and mobile facilities in provinces and districts throughout the country. This national footprint allows for ease of access and interaction with relevant public and private sector structures as well as with SMMEs that are located in rural areas.

STELLA NDABENI-ABRAHAMS

MINISTER: SMALL BUSINESS DEVELOPMENT

Reply:

(1)(a) Details of the cost of building 35 houses are:

DETAILS OF THE COST	Qty	Rate	Amount
Planning and design services by architectural, civil and electrical engineer. Including construction supervision and monitoring for 12 months	1	R1 813 440,05	R1 813 440,05
Construction of 64m2 house, with three-bedroom, open plan kitchen and living room, bathroom with shower and toilet,	35	R 433 297,31	R15 165 405,85
Off-grid 5Kva solar power producing 10KWh per day, with power bank for two days. Including 150L Solar Geysers installed on 35 houses and 1 RDP house built by Municipality for storm damage victim was also powered with solar	36	R 176 975,14	R 6 371 105,04
Sewer reticulation and septic tanks installed to two sites divided by national highway in Paardeplaats Farm	2	R 961 865,51	R 1 923 731,02
Sewer reticulation and septic tanks installed to two sites divided by river stream in Rietfontein	2	R 300 178,75	R 600 357,50
Water reticulation in two sites in Paardeplaats including two 20 000L Elevated tanks, drilling of two Boreholes equipped with refurbished of old windmills	2	R 635 216,26	R 1 270 432,52
Water reticulation in two sites in Rietfontein including two 10 000L Elevated tanks, drilling of two Boreholes equipped with new of solar pumps	2	R 486 695,00	R 973 390,00
Rehabilitation of 4KM gravel access road in Rietfontein and rehabilitation of site drainage in Paardeplaats Farm	1	R 797 421,00	R 797 421,00

b) The details of the contractors who did the work is Masikhane Civil Contractors CC of 855 Longclaw Flight Street, Hazeview 1242 with registration number 1999/011128/23 and CIDB registration number 110071.

(2) Details of current farming and/or business activities:

a) The Department purchased the Remaining Extent of portion 15 of the farm Paardeplaats 380 JT measuring 39.9301 in settlement of 6 labour tenants claims and secured land tenure of 59 farm dwellers. The current agricultural activities are subsistence farming in the form of crops and livestock. The Department is in engagement with the beneficiaries to assist with other development activities.

b) The Department purchased portion 7 of the farm Rietfontein 365 JT measuring 126.1129 and portion 17 of the farm Rietfontein 365 JT measuring 212.5430 which makes a total of 338.6559 in extent in settlement of 2 labour tenants claims and secured land tenure of 23 farm dwellers. The current agricultural activities are subsistence farming in the form of crops and livestock. The Department is in engagement with the beneficiaries to assist with other development activities.

(3) Yes. The Department has assisted the communities to establish legal entities namely; Siyaphumula Communal Property Associations for Paardeplaats community and Mtsweni-Letswalo Communal Property Associations for Rietfontein community. Should the CPAs take a resolution to allocate title deeds to each household, the Department will then assist with subdivision and transfer of land to individual households in title guided by policy provisions.

Reply:

The Department of Agriculture, Land Reform and Rural Development (DALRRD) contributes to the Poultry Master Plan mainly from the Sanitary and Phytosanitary point of view. Veterinary guidelines relevant to poultry have been updated. This is supplemented with training of developing poultry farmers to ensure their participation in the sector. Challenges that are identified with some importing countries’ legislation are constantly being addressed to ensure compliance.

DALRRD continues to encourage poultry producers to use existing compartments which are monitored on a regular basis. An important market that has been identified includes Saudi Arabia and the questions they are asking are being addressed. Heat treated poultry is now consistently being exported to the United Arab Emirates as a health certificate has now been agreed to.

The poultry industry and DALRRD are working on an acceptable residue monitoring programme to make it possible for more markets to be opened. Recently, the United Kingdom has provided guidelines that will be taken into consideration as negotiations begin. The Sub-Region has managed to open its doors for South African poultry despite concerns of outbreaks of Avian Influenza in some provinces.

There are response mechanisms in place which are triggered whenever; there is a case of dumping from any of the country’s trade partners. In the year since the Poultry Master Plan, a new tariff was put on imported poultry to provide protection to local production. Industry complaints with regard to the observed dumping of bone-in chicken meat imports in the Southern African Customs Union market received a positive response in the form of Provisional Anti-Dumping duties imposed on the products in question. Anti-Dumping duties were imposed on the following countries by the International Trade Administration Commission (ITAC) between January and June 2022:

No.	Country	Rate of Duty Prior to January 2022	New Anti-Dumping Duties from January 2022 to June 2022
1	Brazil	MFN Duty of 62%	265%
2	Denmark	Duty free	67.4%
3	Ireland	Duty free	158.4%
4	Poland	Duty free	96.9%
5	Spain	Duty free	85.8%

To support the implementation of the poultry master plan, DALRRD entered into a collaboration with the Industrial Development Corporation (IDC) to provide blended funding to poultry producers and expand production to meet the local demand as well as for exports. The IDC has funded 5 black commercial producers to date at a combined value of R152 million of which R77 million was the grant portion, creating 149 jobs. The five applicants were from Gauteng, Mpumalanga and KwaZulu-Natal. Three of the approved transactions were poultry farm expansions with an average cycle of 430 000 chickens per cycle.

Furthermore, in the 2021/22 financial year, the DALRRD made available R130, 249 million from CASP and Ilima/Letsema as shown in the table below. This investment was meant to support 3 857 poultry farmers with poultry structures, feed and medication, and create 2 183 jobs; with an average cycle of 31 440 chickens per cycle. The table below further shows the planned outputs per province. The Provincial Departments of Agriculture implement these programmes and the 2021/22 annual reports are being audited.

Province	CASP Allocation R'000	Ilima/Letsema Allocation R'000	Total Invested in Poultry in 2021/22 through Conditional Grants R'000	Planned Outputs	CASP Jobs	Ilima/Letsema Jobs	Total Jobs	Farmers Supported
Eastern Cape	4 300	3 600	7 900	1 Poultry structure; production inputs	23	0	23	15
Free State	3 500	1 522	5 022	1 Poultry structure; production inputs	4	0	4	2
Gauteng	11 491	14 500	25 991	3 Poultry structures; production inputs	6	70	76	35
KwaZulu Natal	22 682	0	22 682	3 Poultry structures; production inputs	348	0	348	386
Limpopo	1 544	14 370	15 914	1 Poultry structures; production inputs	23	1 589	1 612	1 046
Mpumalanga	30 150	0	30 150	4 Poultry structures; production inputs	55	0	55	9
Northern Cape	3 100	0	3 100	1 Poultry structure; production inputs	6	0	6	7
North West	10 600	0	10 600	2 Poultry structures; production inputs	22	0	22	2
Western Cape		8 890	8 890	1 Poultry structure; production inputs	22	15	37	54
Total	87 367	42 882	130 249		509	1 674	2 183	1556

Reply:

The South African Police Service or Department of Justice and Constitutional Development would be in a better position to respond to the above question, especially due to admission of guilt options having been determined by the Judiciary on various of these contraventions.

Persons charged with offences related to contraventions in terms of the State of Disaster Regulations, may have paid admission of guilt at either a Police Station or any Court house. The dockets, in which admission of guilt were paid, would not be sent to the National Prosecuting Authority – except if the admission of guilt fine may have been set aside in in terms of Section 57(7) of the criminal Procedure Act, Act 51 of 1977. The National Prosecuting Authority will therefore not have the requested information.

Reply:

(a),(b) The Department has consulted with the Onderstepoort Biological Products (OBP) and requests that the OBP be given more time to provide the information necessary to respond to the questions. This will assist the Department of Agriculture, Land Reform and Rural Development (DALRRD) to respond to the questions with certainty and accuracy, which it undertakes to do by 30 June 2022.

Reply:

It is recommended that the question be transferred to the National Treasury as they have overview of the funds returned by the municipalities, causes of the inability to spend their budgets and the corrective measures to deal with this challenge.

Reply:

1. The project, Cathedral Peak Outgrowers (3 sites) has over the years of implementation to date been allocated a total budget of R54, 9 million. Below is a summary of budget allocation and sources over time:

a) Amaswazini Vineyard total R19 831 198;

b) Amazizi Vineyard total R13 975 876; and

c) Amangwane Vineyard amount R20 287 882.

CATHEDRAL PEAK OUTGROWERS BUDGET & EXPENDUTURE
	2015/16	2016/17	2017/18	2018/19	2019/20	2020/21	2021/22	2022/23
COGTA Allocation	R2 500 000	R5 200 000	R551 978	R0,00	R0,00	R0,00	R0,00	R0,00
Expenditure COGTA	R2 500 000	R4 979 352	R551 978	R0,00	R0,00	R0,00	R0,00	R0,00
ADA/DARD Allocation	R0,00	R2 500 000	R11 162 560	R14 000 00	R8 420 000	R7 925 200	R3 487 715	R431 909
Expenditure ADA/DARD	R0,00	R5 144 658	R11 162 360	R14 000 00	R8 420 000	R4 437485	R3 355 806	R37 355
Total Expenditure to date/annum	R2 500 000	R10 124 011	R11 714 338	R14 000 000	R8 420 000	R4 437 485	R3 355 806	R37 355
Expenditure to date is up to 12 May 2022. Total Allocation to date: R54 959 738. Total Expenditure to date: R54 588 994. Percentage budget spent 99%

(2)(a) There were no permanent jobs created over the period, all jobs created were linked to projects which ultimately came to an end.

(b) A total of 203 casual jobs were created including annually sustained over the period of project implementation (2015/16 to 2021/22).

3. Each vineyard is 15ha in extent, thus a total of 45 hectares altogether.

4. Date of first harvest was expected in each site as per table below:

Amaswazi Site	Amangwane site	Amazizi site
Feb 2021	Feb 2021	Feb 2023

5. Beneficiaries of the proceeds from the project at each of the three locations:

a) The intended beneficiaries of proceeds from the grape enterprise are the nominated cooperatives per site that the project was implemented with and funds transferred to over the period of implementation. These are:

• Inkosi Mthethwa Cooperative for Amazizi Site;
• Amangwane Primary Cooperative for the Amangwane Site; and
• Madlangampisi Cooperative for the Amaswazi site.

b) The employment opportunities created in each site and for the overall project can be considered a benefit for those who were employed over the period of project implementation. From an accumulated budget of R54,9 million an estimated total of R30.3 million served to pay for labour and working capital. An estimated total of 203 employment opportunities of the amount over the years. All labour was compensated at sectoral determined rates per annum. These are not new jobs per annum but sustained opportunities per annum.

Year	Amaswazi Site	Amangwane Site	Amazizi Site
2015/16	65	73	0
2016/17	30	35	0
2017/18	30	30	60
2019/20	30	30	35
2020/21	30	30	37
2021/22	16	26	12

 

Reply:

The National Prosecuting Authority (NPA) does not keep record of matters against illegal immigrants. We are moving towards electronic information where the nationality of an accused will be recorded but it does not reflect the legality of their residence or working permits. When an illegal immigrant is convicted and sentenced, they are channelled from the courts to the Department of Correctional Services until the Department of Home Affairs can deport such individuals after serving the sentence. The Department of Home Affairs would be the most appropriate Department to respond to the question as they keep records of these cases.

Since the information on part (a) of the question is not available, the NPA is not able to respond to the part (b) of the question relating to the categories of crimes.

Reply:

The Chief Ombud will be required to recuse himself or herself from the discussion of matters that may cause a conflict of interest. Section 18(3) of the Sectional Titles Schemes Management Act, Act 8 of 2011 provides for the appointment of a deputy chairperson. Such matters will therefore be dealt with under the leadership of the deputy chairperson.

Reply:

The concerns around the cancellation of registration of the Centre for Fine Art Animation and Design (Pty) Ltd (“CFAD”) has been ongoing for a long period of time. The following is a detailed response to the Question.

THE LEGAL CONTEXT

The Department has the statutory responsibility of regulating the activities of private higher education institutions in accordance with the Higher Education Act, 1997 (Act No. 101 of 1997) (the Act) and the Regulations for the Registration of Private Higher Education Institution, 2016 (the Regulation). To that end, the Department wishes to bring the following your attention:

1.  Article 29(3) of the Constitution of the Republic of South Africa requires every private provider of education and training to be registered with the State. The State in this case is the Department of Higher Education and Training. In this regard, there are two sets of legislation applicable to the registration of private providers of education and training:

a) Higher Education Act, 1997, Act No. 101 of 1997 for the registration of private higher education institutions; and

b) Continuing Education and Training Colleges Act, 1996 for the registration of private colleges.

2. The legal point of departure for registration with the Department begins with the registration of the qualification on the National Qualifications Framework (NQF) and the accreditation of the programme and the college or institution by the relevant Quality Council (QC). There are 3 QCs, each one responsible for managing its own qualifications sub-framework. The QCs and the qualifications sub-frameworks are as follows:

a) Council on Higher Education (CHE) manages the Higher Education Qualifications Sub-Framework (HEQSF);

b) UMALUSI which manages the General and Further Education and Training Qualifications Sub-Framework (GENFETQSF); and

c) QCTO which manages the Occupational Qualifications Sub-Framework (OQSF).

3. The purpose of registration is to ensure that private providers of education and training operate within the law, have the necessary resources, capacity and expertise to offer acceptable standards of higher education, the programmes they offer are registered, the qualifications the students attain are aligned to the NQF and students are protected from fraudulent operators in higher education. Further, the Department is required to ensure the highest standards of integrity at all levels, that the Department discharges its responsibilities in an accountable manner and that it protects the public against any form of malicious and unscrupulous conduct threatening the higher education system.

4. With regard to the above, please note that accreditation and registration are two separate functions undertaken separately by two different bodies. For higher education, the registering authority is the Department, and the accreditation body is the CHE.

REASONS FOR THE CANCELLATION OF THE REGISTRATION OF THE CENTRE FOR FINE ART, ANIMATION AND DESIGN (PTY) LTD AS A PRIVATE HIGHER EDUCATION INSTITUTION

5. On 27 June 2016, the Registrar of Private Higher Education Institutions cancelled the registration of CFAD for its failure to submit a complete 2014 annual report, after due legal process was followed, and after much pleading with officials from CFAD to submit its annual report. The submission of the annual report is a legal requirement for maintenance of registration as a private higher education institution as it allows the Registrar to establish if the institution has discharged its responsibilities as a private higher education institution. Subsequently, on 15 September 2016, the appeal lodged with the erstwhile Minister, Dr BE Nzimande, was successful.

6. For the second time, on 20 November 2016, the Registrar cancelled the registration of CFAD for its failure to submit its 2015 annual report, after due legal process was followed, and after much pleading with officials from CFAD to submit its annual report. Subsequently, on 7 April 2017, the appeal lodged with the Minister, Dr BE Nzimande was unsuccessful, for the following reasons:

a) Failure to Submit the Institution’s Administrative Data;

b) Failure to Provide Staff and Student Data;

c) Failure to Submit Audited Annual Financial Statements;

d) Failure to Submit the Financial Surety which had expired;

e) Failure to Comply with the Occupational Health and Safety Regulations;

f) Failure to Provide Proof of Certificate Awarded to Students;

g) Failure to comply with the Requirements of the National Learner’s Records Database (NLRD);

h) Failure to Provide the Updated Record of the Directors of the Company as Approved by the Consumer Intellectual Property Commission (CIPC);

i) Failure to Submit the List of Premises on which Teaching and Learning is Provided; and

j) Failure to submit the Declaration Signed by Every Student.

7. Since the start of the registration of private higher education institutions in 1998, it has never been the case that an institution of higher learning was unable to submit its annual report in the required manner, including basic information. It has also never been the case whereby the Department had to plead with an institution to submit its annual report and indefinitely prolong the period of extension. In 2015 and 2016, CFAD was the first such institution.

8. Even the appeal was submitted only after the Department pleaded with CFAD to submit the appeal for the simple reason that the Department wanted to protect the interest students. For that matter, the appeal was only submitted a month after the due date for the submission of the appeal.

9. After parents pleaded with the Department to extend the phase-out period to 31 December 2017 so that final year students will not be affected, the Department contacted Dr N Soobben and pleaded with him to make a formal request with Mr GF Qonde, the Director-General, for an extension to the phase-out period from 31 December 2016 to 31 December 2017. Since the Department no longer had the contact details of the institution, and CFAD was not communicating with the Department, the Department had requested a parent, Ms Allison Shepherd, to provide Dr N Soobben’s cell phone number.

10. At the time of the first cancellation of registration of CFAD, there was no communication or response from CFAD to the Department’s queries. For almost 3 years, repeated calls to CFAD went unanswered. At no stage did CFAD approach the Department or the CHE for assistance regarding the problems it claims to have experienced. It was the Department that had to initiate the communication with CFAD.

11. In August 2017, officials from the Department paid a site visit to the institution at 5 Walnut Road, Smart XChange Building in Durban to endeavour to assist the institution. Subsequent to the visit, two further site visits were made on 24 January 2018 and 25 April 2018, respectively. In the last site visit Dr Shaheeda Essack requested an improvement plan from CFAD which has not as yet been submitted.

12. On 7 June 2018, the Department was informed that on 31 May 2018, the Sherriff of the Court, repossessed all goods of value from CFAD. The pictures on the repossession were circulated on social media.

13. According to the accreditation report dated 28 February 2017, the CHE has withdrawn the accreditation of the institution and its programme. This means that CFAD is no longer accredited with the CHE. The outcome on the subsequent application for accreditation with the CHE is pending. Therefore, the application for registration submitted to the Department is awaiting proof of accreditation from the CHE and the submission of the improvement plan as requested in the meeting of 25 April 2018.

14 In 2018, the High Court in Durban acceded to CFAD’s request to operate in 2018 and 2019 so as to teach out the pipe-line and final year students. The High Court also ruled that no new students should be enrolled.

15. The Minister is also aware that CFAD has filed papers with the High Court in Durban to suspend the Registrar’s decision to cancel its registration and to suspend the Minister’s decision to dismiss the appeal. The Registrar and the Minister await the ruling of the High Court.    

DIRECT RESPONSE TO THE ENQUIRY

16. The Minister is fully aware of the challenges surrounding the cancellation of registration of CFAD and advises CFAD to ensure that its application for registration with the Department is complete to enable the Registrar to register the institution. Since accreditation is a separate function from registration and handled by the CHE, the institution is advised to contact the CHE directly for any enquiries on accreditation.

17.  The High Court had also allowed CFAD until 2019 to teach out final year students, most of whom were in their final year in 2018 and some in 2019. Therefore, the “situation of distress” always referred to is not understood.

18. The Department has done everything in its power to assist CFAD in the registration process. Unfortunately, the application currently does not qualify for registration since it has not provided the evidence that it meets the accreditation requirements of the CHE and the registration requirements of SAQA.

19. CFAD, therefore, does not have the legal authority to operate an institution of higher learning

Reply:

Based on the report submitted by the KwaZulu-Natal Provincial Department of Human Settlements as of 30 May 2022, the required information is as follows:

Reply:

a) The Commission has created a 5 year project plan which will be concluded depending on available resources.

Output Indicator	PROVINCES	Outstanding land Claims	Pure Outstanding	Phased
Number of outstanding land claims	Eastern Cape	657	597	60
	Free State	5	5	0
	Gauteng	379	370	9
	KwaZulu-Natal	2124	2045	79
	Limpopo	1349	1073	276
	Mpumalanga	1588	1170	418
	Northern Cape	37	22	15
	North West	208	22	186
	Western Cape	338	326	12
	TOTAL:	6685	5630	1055

b) When Parliament enacts new legislation to allow the processing of these New Order Claims.

c) It would be difficult to forecast for the 163 383 new order claims as we have not conducted any analysis because of the LAMOSA judgment which interdicted the Commission from processing these New order claims.

END

Reply:

Matters related to the eviction of farm dwellers including land purchase and accommodation thereof is a function of the Department of Agriculture Land Reform and Rural Development.  The Human Settlements National and Provincial Departments provide support to farm dwellers as provided for by the Housing Code in terms of the Farm Residents Subsidy which covers the following:-

 

a) A flexible approach to cater to the variety of farm residents’ housing needs across the country;

b) The provision of secure tenure to farm workers;

c) The promotion of healthy and safe living environments;

d) The empowerment of farm residents’ (and in particular women) to participate in the provision of their own housing needs, as appropriate in the particular farming situation;

e) Where possible, promoting access to social and economic amenities;

f) Promoting access to economic opportunities not related to farming (particular when seasonal farm work is not available) (particularly when seasonal farm work is not available) for households where appropriate;

g) The encouragement of sustainable spatial settlement patterns and discouraging the development of farm residents housing that places an additional service delivery burden on municipalities;

h) The use of local labour and the development of skills in both developing and maintaining farm resident settlements; and

i) The upgrading of existing farm resident housing and improving the security of tenure where feasible and practicable

Total funds spent between 2020/21 - 2021/22 financial year by the Provincial Departments on housing programmes is shown below:

Reply:

The following breakdown is the departmental expenditure incurred during the tenure of the previous Minister:

a) Expenditure on travel for;                                    (i) 2018-19 of R 68 531 385.59

                                                                            (ii) 2019-20 of R 68 211 236.86

                                                                            (iii) 2020-21of R 25 015 936.36

b) Expenditure on flights for;                                   (i) 2018-19 of R 26 230 031.61

                                                                            (ii)2019-20 of R 28 611 599.32

                                                                             (iii) 2020-21 of R 6 421 952.02

c) Expenditure on accommodation for;                      (i) 2018-19 of R 11 365 036.35

                                                                              ii) 2019-20 of R 13 115 787.37

                                                                              (iii) 2020-21 of R 4 103 731.22

d) Expenditure on catering for;                                   (i) 2018-19 of R 7 775 699.57

                                                                               (ii) 2019-20 of R 18 788 746.96

                                                                                (iii) 2020-21of R 11 386 717.55

e) Expenditure on flowers for;                                      (i) 2018-19 of R 18 245.16

                                                                                (ii) 2019-20 of R 4 200.00

                                                                                 (iii) 2020-21 of R 12 558.40

Reply:

1. No. However, at the time of allocation of the farm to this certain person, various movable assets in the form of mechanization, implements and equipment to the value of R6 900 000.00 as well as biological assets (sheep) to the value of R3 933 000.00 with a combined total of R10 833 000.00 were in the register of the farm.

2. The Department of Agriculture, Land Reform and Rural Development (DALRRD) has received a Comprehensive Agricultural Support Programme (CASP) application through the Western Cape Provincial Department of Agriculture which is being considered for provision of production inputs following its assessment of the farm and the farmer’s needs.

(a) The application is for the 2022/23 financial year. If this application is approved, funds are to be transferred to the Western Cape Provincial Department of Agriculture as per the approved business plan.

(b) The application under consideration is for production inputs to the value of R2 124 270 and maintenance of farm implements at a cost R147 576.

Reply:

NOTE: The performance figures in this reply have not yet been audited.

1. The total number of housing opportunities delivered and/or completed nationally, in terms of the Housing Code, in the 2021-22 financial year is 46 489 serviced sites and 44 471 housing units.  The serviced sites and housing units are not added to avoid double counting as housing units are constructed on serviced sites.

2. The total number of (a) serviced sites and (b) housing units delivered and/or completed in each province in the specified financial year is as follows:

(a) 

Province	2021/22 FY
	Serviced sites
Eastern Cape	5 731
Free State	8 150
Gauteng	11 599
KwaZulu-Natal	2 380
Limpopo	2 525
Mpumalanga	3 907
Northern Cape	2 542
North West	6 723
Western Cape	2 932
Total	46 489

 

(b)

Province	2021/22 FY
	Housing units
Eastern Cape	6 780
Free State	1 426
Gauteng	7 331
KwaZulu-Natal	11 803
Limpopo	4 928
Mpumalanga	2 961
Northern Cape	591
North West	2 734
Western Cape	5 917
Total	44 471

3. The total number of (a) serviced sites and (b) housing units were delivered and/or completed in each metropolitan municipality in the specified financial year is as follows:

a) 

Metropolitan Municipality	2021/22  up to Q3
	Serviced sites
Buffalo City	220
Nelson Mandela Bay	0
Mangaung	0
City of Ekurhuleni	1 340
City of Johannesburg	0
City of Tshwane	0
Ethekwini	0
City of Cape Town	1 077
Total	2 637

b) Metropolitan Municipalities do not deliver housing units as it is a Provincial function.

 

Reply:

1. All plans are reflected in all Annual Performance Plans as tabled in various legislatures and available on websites with the targets
2. Plans for the Metropolitan municipalities will be shared once councils have approved them. These are developed by Provincial departments.
3. All the Human Settlements Development Grant allocation is reflected on the Annual Performance Plan.

Reply:

The recommended amendments to the Policy Framework are consistent with the recommendations of the legal opinion. Pre and post the amendment, the prime focus of the Language Policy has been and will always be an attempt at realising the Constitutional ideals of linguistic equality in post-apartheid South Africa.

Our primary objective is to extend to the historically marginalised African languages the same privilege historically enjoyed by Afrikaans and English as the exclusive languages of scholarship in pre-democratic South Africa. The definition of indigenous languages in the Policy Framework will be amended as per the legal advice received and there has never been dispute in the Language Policy Framework on the status of Afrikaans as an indigenous language.

Reply:

The body corporate is represented by all the owners of a sectional title scheme. Regulation 5(3) of the Sectional Titles Schemes Management Act, Act 8 of 2011 provides for the election of trustees by the body corporate. The trustees exercise the body corporate’s powers and functions assigned and delegated to them in terms of section 7(1) of the Sectional Titles Schemes Management Act, Act 8 of 2011.

Body corporates are not obligated to appoint a managing agent but may do so to perform the functions and exercise the powers that would otherwise be performed by the trustees in terms of Regulation 28(1) of the Sectional Titles Schemes Management Act, Act 8 of 2011. The appointment of a managing agent is not imposed upon a body corporate but elected by the body corporate. As such, a body corporate has the right to challenge a managing agent through the available legislative mechanisms should it be of the view that its rights have been infringed through misconduct by the managing agent.

In appointing the Sectional Titles Schemes Management Advisory Council, the skills, knowledge and experience of the candidates in the management of a range of types of schemes will be taken into account. This includes trustees or owners who have skills, knowledge and experience in the management of schemes.

Reply:

The department is currently obtaining the responses from the abovementioned munucipalities and we will provide response as soon as we receive it.

Reply:

Attached find here: Reply

Reply:

1. (a) The strategy of the Department to combat Diabetes is contained in the National Strategic Plan for the Prevention and Control of Non-Communicable Diseases 2022- 2027 (NSP NCDs). The Plan provides strategic guidance on the prevention, early detection, screening, and control of non-communicable diseases including diabetes. The NSP NCDS is aligned to the Integrated Clinical Services Management Model as part of the Ideal Clinic, the Adult Primary Care Tool implemented at primary health care facilities, the Essential Medicines List and 1Associated Standard Treatment Guidelines, the Centralised Chronic Medicine Dispensing and Distribution (CCMDD) Model. NCDs are integrated into the Primary Health Care Service Package (2015).

(b) The department developed and implemented the “Strategy for the prevention and control of obesity in South Africa 2015 – 2020”. The strategy is aimed at the prevention and control of obesity through modifying the obesogenic environments and drivers of obesity, while enhancing opportunities for increased physical activity and healthy food options in every possible setting, including healthcare facilities, early development centres, schools, workplaces, and the community at large. The strategy reached the end of its term and the Department is in the process of developing the updated strategy which began by reviewing the 2015-2020 strategy using interrogation of the theory of change in line with South Africa’s international policy commitments and national legislation, policy and plans, a literature review of international and national best practices, wide stakeholder engagement through online survey and small physical meetings, and finally, a national workshop with stakeholders. The best practices, stakeholder engagements and the review reports have been produced. The Department is currently consulting key stakeholders on the first draft of the updated strategy.

(2) (a) (i) The following are programmes to currently in place to combat obesity:

• Implementation of the National guide for Healthy meal provisioning in the workplace in collaboration with the Department of Public Service and Administration
• Implementation of the Nutrition Guidelines for Early Childhood Development programmes in collaboration with the Departments of Basic Education and Social Development
• Increasing the availability of healthy food options through Healthy Food Options Initiatives programme of the Consumer Goods Council of South Africa
• Nutrition education, information and advocacy in health facilities, ECD centres, schools, workplaces and communities at large through various campaigns e.g. World Breastfeeding Week, National Nutrition Week, Healthy Lifestyle Awareness Day and World Obesity Day in collaboration with other government departments, non-government organisations, dietetics and nutrition profession associations and academic institutions.
• Promotion of physical activity in collaboration with Department of Sport, Arts and Culture
• Nutrition assessment, education and counselling of individuals in health facilities
• Nutrition screening, assessment and referral of overweight and obese learners through the Integrated School Health Programme
• Conducting research to guide policy and interventions i.e., National Dietary Intake Survey

(ii) Programmes currently in place to combat diabetes among others include.

• Conducting health education and awareness programs on the need to promote wellness generally and on the causes of Diabetes during the commemoration of health events.
• Undertaking screening for diabetes and referral of persons who fail screening or are at high risk, to health facilities including by trained Community Health Workers.
• Creating access to medicines and consumables through the CCMDD Program,
• Establishing a National Tender to ensure the availability of Strips for Glucometers
• Ensuring that required medicines are on the Essential Medicines List.
• Collaborating with relevant Stakeholders including civil society organisations and persons living with NCDS, including Diabetes.

(b) The current allocation to combat obesity and diabetes are inclusive of the Equitable Share received by provinces. The programme does not have a ring-fenced allocation however the Chronic Diseases and Health Promotion Levy budget is also used for these programmes.

END.

Reply:

(a) The Executive Mayor, Councillor Ndikinda issued a media statement condemning the assault of the Councilor Rulashe and committed to investigate the matter further. In addition the ADM has been visited by several delegation from Minister of CoGTA and MEC to engage relevant parties affected by the incident. (b) The Executive Mayor requested protection services for Councilor Rulashe from the MEC for Safety and Liaison in the Province. Furthermore, a Threat and Risk Assessemnt report by Crime Intelligence was recieved whereby protection services were commissioned for three months to Councilor Rulashe. The Executive Mayor launched a preliminary report whose findings were reported to Council where it was resolved that an external independant legal firm be commissioned to conduct full investigation and report on its findings. Further steps taken by ADM is that the ADM official responsible for the incident was suspended, secondly a correspondence was made to the Secuirty Company to take disciplinary steps on their employees involved on the incident. 

Reply:

a) The following table shows the fatal crashes and fatalities from 1 Jan 2022 to 31 May 2022 per province

Province	Fatal Crashes
EC	443
FS	207
GP	733
KZN	641
LP	408
MP	262
NC	116
NW	249
WC	475
Grand Total	3534

b) Recorded causes in each of the 2 cases

According the information received from the crash investigation team, the causes of the two crashes on the N3 were as follows;

• Saturday 28 May 2022 Fatal crash ;
• The accident involved 2 trucks which were both travelling on the fast lanes prohibited for trucks at the said location, at speeds too high for the conditions where upon the one which had mechanical brake failure fatally ramped at the back of another resulting in the high number of the 16 fatalities recorded .
• There is proper signage channelising heavy trucks into a single left lane but from time-to-time drivers ignore the road signs and utilise the right hand lanes exclusively reserved for light motor vehicles.
• Since the road construction begun in the area there has been a number of accidents caused by drivers who were travelling at high speeds for conditions and not reducing speeds as expected.

• Sunday 29 May 2022 Fatal crash ;

According to the crash investigation team there were no signs of attempted braking during the crash identified at the scene which supports the suspicion of fatigue as the main cause of the crash resulting in the high number of the 10 fatalities recorded. The stretch of road where the fatal crash occurred is not a high risk crash site and this was an isolated incident.

c) measures have been implemented to prevent the recurrence of such accidents.

• In relation to the KZN N3 Peter town identified high risk area the KZN Provincial Traffic have engaged Sanral to extend the channelising signages further down past the mall and have prioritised the deployment of officers from 22H00 to 06H00 until the end of the road construction.

• In relation to the N3 Grootvlei fatal crash the Mpumalanga Provincial Traffic will closely monitor the area through the current N3 team assigned to that stretch of the road.

Reply:

a) The Department of Transport is currently assisting Road Authorities through the Shamba Sonke Programme and it is a nation-wide initiative involving all Provincial Road Authorities.

Provincial Road Authorities are supported through this Provincial Road Maintenance Grant (PRMG):

• for routine, periodic, and special maintenance;
• for rehabilitation of paved roads, limited to a maximum of 25% of the value of the PRMG allocation per province;
• to ensure all roads are identified, proclaimed and reclassified as per the COTO publication TRH26 Road Classification and Access Management Manual;
• to collect road inventory data to maintain an up-to-date RAMP;
• for the repair of roads and bridges damaged by declared natural disasters;
• to improve the state / condition of the road network serving rural areas; and
• to improve road safety with a special focus on NMT safety

The PRMG is also used on the rural road networks to gather road data where District Municipalities are supported through the Rural Road Asset Management Systems Grant (RRAMSG) to:

• collect condition data (paved and unpaved) for the municipal road networks within the boundaries of the District Municipality in accordance with the COTO publication, TMH9 Manual for Visual Assessment of Road Pavements;
• collect traffic data on selected intersections of the municipal road network;
• collect data on the condition of structures (bridges and culverts) as per the COTO publication, TMH19 Manual for the Visual Assessment of Road Structures; and
• develop a Road Asset Management Plan (RAMP) in line with the COTO publication, TMH22 Road Asset Management Manual to inform maintenance and investment via the Municipal Infrastructure Grant (MIG).

The inspections in loco are performed by the technical teams to ensure quality assurance of road infrastructure delivered. Back to basic ethos are adhered to within the limited scarcity of technical resources.

b) In terms of the Division of Revenue Act (DORA), these funds has to be transferred to the Provinces and municipalities, who are the “implementing Agents”. Therefore, at this stage, the Department is reliant on the Provinces and Municipalities to insource the works as much as possible.

In most provinces, there is some form of insourcing taking place through implementation of projects using in-house teams. In the case of the Western Cape, additional insourcing is taking place through the appointment of the District Municipalities as an Implementing Agent by the province. The District Municipalities has their own staff.

The Department intends to change the Schedule of these grants to become an “Indirect Grant”, which allow the department to implement the works on behalf of the Provinces and Municipalities.

If this proposal is accepted by the Budget Council and the DORA is supported, as such, by Parliament and approved by the President, the Department plans to insource the works as much as possible within reason.

Reply:

Attached find here: Reply

Reply:

Attached find here: Reply

Reply:

a) (i) Warmbad Hospital has medication available and patients have been issued with medication, for scripts issued by the medical officers in the hospital, as follows:

• April 2022: 1,560 scripts dispensed with a value of R780,000.50. 30 % of these scripts had Panado as one of the medicine items, with other items, dispensed

• May 2022: 1,469 scripts dispensed with a value of R678,000.90. 27 % of these scripts had Panado as one of the medicine items, with other items, dispensed

(ii) Ambulances operate in Limpopo from 56 ambulance stations, providing a primary emergency response to communities. Bela-Bela Local Municiplaity is served by two EMS stations namely Warmbad & Pienaarsrivier.

Warmbad EMS Station has five ambulances, with three crewed ambulances per shift. Pienaarsrivier has three ambulances, with two crewed ambulances per shift. Pienaarsrivier received a new ambulanced in April 2022. The province is in the process of procuring another 28 ambulances, that would be distributed based on needs, determined by call volumes. The Ambulances are provided to the Emergency Medical Services (EMS) Stations in the districts as they are responsible for EMS and not directly to the hospital.

b) Refer to response to (a)(ii) above.

 

END.

Reply:

a) (i) The Council for Medical Schemes (CMS) regulates medical schemes, and in terms of the Medical Schemes Act 131 of 1998, any entity that conducts the business of a medical scheme must be registered with CMS. Insurance companies that were previously offering primary health care products as insurance products are prohibited by the Demarcation Regulations from doing so, as primary health care products are no longer regarded as insurance products but products doing the business of a medical scheme. This has been in effect from 1 April 2017. These insurance companies could not afford to immediately convert into medical schemes due to the nature and pricing of insurance products as opposed to those for pricing health insurance products.

(ii) Medical insurance products, as defined by the Demarcation Regulations published in terms of the Long- and Short-term Insurance Acts on 23 December 2016 (Government Gazette No. 40515), are regulated by the Financial Sector Conduct Authority (FSCA).

b) To safeguard the interests of people who were already policyholders of the primary health care products offered by the affected insurance companies (prior to 1 April 2017), the Ministers of Health and of Finance concurred that the insurance companies must approach the CMS to apply for an exemption from complying with the provisions of section 20(1) of the Medical Schemes Act, until a Low-Cost Benefit Option (LCBO) framework is adopted. This would allow current policyholders to migrate into the LCBO medical schemes environment when finalised and implemented. Insurance companies that applied and received an exemption from the CMS in terms of section 8(h) of the MSA are now offering primary health care products under the oversight of CMS.

END.

Reply:

The department is currently obtaining the response from the District Munucipality and we will provide response as soon as we receive it.

Reply:

(a) The Minister met with both the management of Sibanye-Stillwater and Labour representatives and emphasized the importance of them reaching an amicable solution.

(b)(i) The Department cannot give any guarantees in this case as the relationship between Employer and Employee is governed by both the Labour Relations Act and Basic Condition of Employment Act, and both are the competency of the Department of Employment and Labour.

(ii) The competent authority to respond to these questions is the Department of Employment and Labour.

Reply:

The national roads in the North-West totalling 2513 km under the South African National Roads Agency SOC Limited (SANRAL) have active routine maintenance contracts in place and are well maintained. In addition, a further estimated R3.8 bn will be spent over the next three years on various maintenance and improvement projects on these national roads in the North-West which will result in the addressing of identified defects on those national road sections that are at the end of their original 20-year design life.

The challenge is with the portions of the national road network which are not currently under the jurisdiction of SANRAL i.e., the N12 through the towns of Wolmaransstad, Klerksdorp and Potchefstroom. Various engagements with the North-West Province are currently underway by my Department which has resulted in SANRAL being appointed as the Implementing Agent by the Province for urgent repairs on the N12 through those towns and those works are currently in progress. As part of these engagements the remaining sections of the national roads in the North-West Province (including the N12) will also be permanently transferred to SANRAL to ensure their proper maintenance.

Reply:

(1) (a) The Ministerial Advisory Committee on COVID-19 Vaccines (VMAC) is mandated to advise the Minister regarding COVID-19 vaccines. The VMAC engaged with SAHPRA on the report from the United States of America’s Food and Drug Authority report on the Pfizer Comirnaty COVID-19 vaccine safety. This report that was released was related to the periodic safety update reports that are released by the FDA, and did not identify any new signals for safety concerns. It was also noted that this report contains more than 49 000 adverse events following immunisations (AEFIs). As such, with the lack of new safety signals in the use of Pfizer Comirnaty COVID-19 vaccine, it’s continued use is still viewed as favourable.

(b) SAPHRA released a media statement on the 11th March 2022, which noted the following: “… the safety report received from the United States of America’s Food and Drug Authority in relation to the Pfizer Comirnaty COVID-19 vaccine. SAHPRA indicated that Pfizer indicates all adverse events of special interest (AESIs) during the reporting period. However, not all AESIs included in the report are linked to the vaccine. As these vaccines are still new, their safety profiles are evolving, and investigations are ongoing; hence the need for continuous monitoring. Based on the latest periodically reported safety data reviewed by SAHPRA for Pfizer COVID-19 vaccines, the benefit-risk profile of this vaccine remains favourable and safe to be administered as per the roll-out schedule.” This media release is available on the SAHPRA website.

(2) Neither the Department nor SAHPRA have changed their stance on the use of the Pfizer Comirnaty COVID-19 vaccine, based on the factors noted above, in other words, that no new safety concerns were found in this data. Registration of medicines in the country is the role of SAHPRA, which is mandated to oversee the safety, efficacy and quality of all health products registered in the country, and this includes vaccines. All the COVID-19 vaccines authorised for use in South Africa have been evaluated for safety, quality, and efficacy, and have proven to prevent serious disease and death from COVID-19. Should new safety signals be raised, this product will be reviewed at that time.

END.

Reply:

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Reply:

Development of oil and gas has great potential to offer South Africa energy independence (and security), economic growth and jobs as long as is developed within the principles of sustainable development.

Reply:

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Reply:

With regard to the placement of foreign qualified medical students for the 2022-23 midyear cycle, applicants are expected to first comply with registration requirements for medical internship as outlined in the Regulation by the Health Professions Council of South Africa (HPCSA) prior allocation in a funded post.

(a) The number of posts that are currently being verified and finalized for the mid-year cycle are as follows per province:

Province	Number of Posts	Status
Eastern Cape	5	Posts are at the final stages of verification by Provinces in line with financial quantum
Free State	20
Gauteng	31
KwaZulu – Natal	29
Limpopo	7
Mpumalanga	3
Northern Cape	5
North West	18
Western Cape	6

(b) All posts are envisaged to be filled on 1 July 2022, with various commencement dates. Since these are replacement posts and current incumbents must first vacate the posts to allow new applicants to commence duty.

END.

Reply:

a) The application for permanent residence with reference number PRP2700955 is currently in final stage of the adjudication and quality assurance the process.

b) The application will be finalised on or before 30 June 2022.

END