FREE STATE WILL SPEND R11.5bn ON EDUCATION

Health to get second biggest chunk of budget

FREE State MEC for finance Elsabe Rockman yesterday said the provincial budget for this financial year would be R29.3-billion.

This is apart from the conditional grant of R6.6-billion and the province ’ s own revenue estimated at R965.8-million.

Rockman said own revenue was secured through new and enhanced debt collection measures.

This, she said, included hunting down debtors who had been in the employ of the public service.

“We must tell it as it was, and do so unapologetically,” Rockman said.

“We developed and formulated the provincial budget we are tabling today well aware of the responsibilities and obligations that our history places on us.”

Rockman said aligned with the objectives of the National Development Plan, the budget seeks to address issues of youth unemployment, underdevelopment and poverty.

She added that stringent fiscal policy stipulations by government should be enforced to ensure spending on the priorities set by the government.

She said priority spending would go to education, which received R11.5-billion – as the central focus for the growth and sustainability of the economy of the province.

This while health, which has been rocked by crises and challenges related to overcrowding and lack of medication, has been allocated the second biggest chunk of the budget.

Rockman said the money would be used for, among other things, addressing challenges relating to HIV and Aids, as well as expanding the male circumcision campaign.

In her concluding remarks, she called on all to pledge to “strive together, sparing neither strength nor courage, until economic freedom has been won”.