Mantashe meets and greets
ANC Secretary General (SG) Gwede Mantashe strongly warned parents not to make their kids spoiled brats, relying on grants, during his door-to-door visit in Grahamstown yesterday.
Mantashe was supposed to visit the PA houses in Extension 6, Hlalani and Vukani location. But he ended up only spending his day in one house in Extension 6 as residents came in numbers when they recognised him. The SG was accompanied by Eastern Cape Legislature Speaker Noxolo Kiviet, ANC Sarah Baartman Secretary Scara Njadayi, Makana Sub-Region Chairperson Mabhuti Matyumza, Riana Meiring and former Buffalo City Mayor Zukiswa Ncitha.
Before even going into a house, the ANC leaders were called by a woman called Sindiswa Ponoshe, who said she wanted to show Mantashe some kids who were living on their own and struggling to survive. “There is a very sad situation here, there are two kids who live by themselves and without parents. They have nothing but you will see for yourself,” said Ponoshe.
The whole ANC contingent went to the house led by her. On arrival Mantashe asked one of the “kids”, Nosisi Menzeleli, how old she was. She said she was 30 years old.
“I have five kids and I left school because of peer pressure. My kids do receive the government child support grant but I’m unemployed,” said Menzeleli.
Mantashe passed on to the second one of the house heads and asked the same questions. The second head of the house said that he left school in Grade 10. That was because he fought with others at school and ended up quitting.
Mantashe asked Ponoshe what she was requesting the government to do in that situation. Ponoshe said she wanted government to intervene and perhaps give the two house heads a grant.
“That cannot happen. Firstly these two people are not kids. How can you refer to a 30 and 25-year-old person as a kid? The government does not give grants to people who are not disabled. “The female one has even indicated that she has five kids and all of them are benefiting from the government child support grant. How can government give her a grant together with her five kids while she is not disabled?
“That means another person who could be maybe 40 years old, and not from this home, would also come to the government and claim that they are not working and the government should give them a grant. Don’t spoil people and call them kids while they are adults,” said Mantashe.
He said they should rather register for the food parcels that are usually given to unemployed, struggling people but not ask for a government grant.
The residents mentioned that they don’t have title deeds to the houses and asked who should fix damages at the houses. They mentioned broken water taps, doors, water pipes and other issues.
Mantashe promised them that Department of Public Works Minister Thulas Nxesi would visit Grahamstown and address some of the issues.
“When we walked in here we discovered that there was a pipe that had burst, we explained the basics that when you are given a house and you break a window frame or a rubber of a tap, you can’t expect the government to come and replace the rubber of the tap or a window frame.
“These are houses of the state. They were inherited by a legal successor, the Cape Provincial Administration. People are staying here and they never had title deeds, they have no houses basically, the houses are property of the state.
“Now the people are raising issues about whether they should rent or buy the houses. What we have committed to do now, is to send the Minister of Public Works to come here and do campaigning in this area and speak to the people.”
In the afternoon, the ANC team went to the manifesto rally in the indoor Sports Centre. Slightly more than 2 000 people attended the rally and the hall was fully packed with no space to move.
The SG said he was not disappointed by the fact that he could not make it to all the locations he was meant to visit. He said he was happy that people came to the house that he went to and asked their questions.
Responding to a question about individuals who had left the ANC and gone independent on the coming local government elections, Mantashe said he was not going to say anything about those individuals.
“I can’t say anything about those people because they are not members of the party now. I could only have said something when they were still with us. Once they leave the ANC I can't talk about them. I only talk on their behalf when they are inside the ANC,” he said.