‘Mayor reckless over jobs project’

TWO Gauteng MECs have accused Johannesburg mayor Herman Mashaba of shutting down employment scheme Jozi@Work purely for political reasons.

Economic development MEC Lebogang Maile, speaking at a media briefing organised by the provincial government’s economic cluster yesterday, said: “The mayor is being petty because this is an ANC programme. I think it’s reckless because there’s about 8 000 people there who are employed and benefiting from these opportunities. In the light of high unemployment and sluggish economic growth, a caring mayor wouldn’t act so recklessly.

“The recklessness is motivated by a political desire to create an impression that the ANC led administration has not done anything good...”

Jozi@Work is a coproduction project that was pioneered by the previous ANCled city administration at a cost of around R1-billion. It was designed to allow communities to partner with the City of Joburg on projects that included mushroom farming, producing paper from stone and solarpowered bakeries using mango flour from South America among others.

Mashaba cancelled the R270-million a year scheme, calling it a “vanity project.”

Cooperative governance and human settlements MEC Paul Mashatile added that there was little he could do to force municipalities to adopt or continue with certain projects as “they have powers to decide what they want to do.”

“It is important that sometime when you deal with projects, you should take politics out and deal with the people. For Jozi@Work, it’s ordinary people that are working out there and cleaning in the townships,” Mashatile said. –