Mabuyane welcomes new investment in province but warns of pitfalls

Eastern Cape premier Oscar Mabuyane opened the provincial Economic Recovery Plan conference in East London on Wednesday with a big thank you to the 11 investors who committed R46.5bn to the province.

The investors, all of whom outlined their investment scope, were: Shoprite, Tshedza Pictures, Transnet, Benteler, Sun Farming, Mhlobiso Concrete, Toyota (Material Handling), Sanaha, SAB, Sanral and Aqora.

However, the premier lowered the upbeat mood by savaging the province’s rural municipalities — the immediate beneficiaries of investment in their areas — for “not having a clue” or doing a decent job of incentivising investors.

“The businesses have brought in billions in investment but I doubt if they [local municipalities] are even aware of it.”

In a remark during an interview with national radio, Mabuyane said accountability was not merely part of a job description for officials, and that those who failed would be sanctioned for poor performance.

Continuing the theme of lacklustre performance in rural areas, Mabuyane cited a cheese factory that had been established in Dordrecht that was now dilapidated. It was built for R800,000, with the money now down the drain — and with it jobs and export potential.

He told the crowd of nearly 1,000 people, a mix of government, municipal and private sector delegates, that Transnet’s promise of investing R9.1bn in Eastern Cape ports — more than R4bn for East London — was welcome.

It would, he said, be the first large investment in more than 50 years and could spur ship building. Dampening the announcement was Transnet pointing out that the spend would be over seven years and there was no word on when it would start.

When it got off the ground, the main task would be to deepen and broaden the harbour entrance, allowing bigger vessels to dock.

There was no comment on how the entrance, with a rock bottom, would be deepened in the face of heavy environmental opposition to blasting.

Mabuyane said impassable roads were bogging down the farming community.

He recently travelled into the hinterland and could understand why farmers were complaining.

Getting equipment to, and produce out of farms, was all but impossible.

Sanral’s budget for the province’s national roads was R17.8bn and the two bridges “in Pondoland would assist in us taming the Wild Coast”.

The premier said a recent national announcement on a budgets for roads, excluding Sanral, was demoralising, because the Eastern Cape was not even included in the budget.

He had immediately challenged this, only to be told that it “was a mistake”, and would be rectified. He was, he said, impressed with all the commitment to new projects from the private sector, “but what we need to know is what are the investors going to do with their profit?”

Mabuyane said Eskom’s woeful performance meant establishing new sources of energy — nuclear, gas and oil — was a priority.

The government had, he said, agreed that the Eastern Cape would host the next nuclear power station, near Jeffreys Bay.

The conference coincided with the launch of the Invest SA One Stop Shop facility, a joint venture involving the Eastern Cape Development Corporation and the department of trade, industry and competition aimed at cutting red tape.

Mabuyane said a provincial investment council, targeting trade and investments, was being established which would include industry, large corporates, established business chamber representatives and CEOS of the provincial state entities.

He would chair the venture.