It’s time we talk about sex ... education, that is

SOUTH Africa is a developing country that is experiencing national and international migration. This is largely experienced by metropolitan cities that need to have or develop infrastructure that can deliver services across spectrums, ie roads, health, education, water, electricity and sanitation.

It is evident that most South African metropolitan municipalities are struggling with the demand to deliver services. The demand exceeds the supply, with a constrained budget required to invest more into infrastructure.

A quote by US Supreme Court Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes: “Taxes are what we pay for a civilised society.” But what happens when the taxes are not enough to cover the costs of the basic needs of a growing population?

Should we be relying on contributions from international development organisations, or is there a way to unlock private sector financing to meet the needs? This is the question that is addressed in Deloitte’s report on Smart Cities Financing and Funding in Developing Economies – including South African insights, issued last month.

In order to decide if private sector financing is a practical solution, we need to understand the magnitude of the shortfall. According to the spending plans published by the government – the updated medium-term expenditure framework and the 2018 National Treasury Estimates of National Expenditure, the revenue collected translated into a shortfall of R110 billion.

With expenditure set to increase to roughly R1.54 trillion in 2020/21, it is clear that something has to be done if we are to meet current demand for learning and culture, health, social development, peace and security, economic development, community development and public services.

While there are examples of private participation in financing local economies internationally, the volume of this kind of contribution in developing economies such as South Africa remains low. Factors such as increasing urbanisation, underinvestment in infrastructure, lack of funds and the negative investment grade ratings of the country all add up to a conviction that if the needs of the population are going to be met, the onus is on the cities themselves to find ways to finance the demands of their citizens.

But where is this pipeline of privately financed or “bankable” initiatives for future demands going to come from? The most common form of public payment for infrastructure is in user fees such as tolls, but there are new trends in financing that could provide much more attractive options.

One such example is the use of value capture to enhance public investment. This is where the value of the investment into existing infrastructure is measured and used to justify special taxes or levies. A project to build new infrastructure or improve existing facilities is likely to increase the value of the land surrounding that project.

This gives the local authority an opportunity to capture some of the appreciation of that value and obtain private financing based on that value increase. A government that builds a new transit hub, for instance, could create a special taxing district around that hub. The transit station will be likely to draw more people into the area, giving nearby businesses access to more customers.

The special tax collected from businesses near the hub can help to offset the cost of the construction project, and businesses will be willing to pay for the direct benefits of the new investment in their area.

Other options are traditional loans and levies, vendor and blended finance, multilateral risk and credit guarantees, leases and joint ventures.

We are seeing encouraging signs of local authorities in developing economies closing the infrastructure gap with smart solutions to deliver works and services to citizens.

Ngcobo is an associate director, digital, and government and public services leader at Deloitte Consulting SA IT’S HARDLY the sin that dare not speak its name, but ever since Onan spilled his seed on the ground in the Old Testament, Christian ministers and priests have had their hands full keeping pubescent teenagers from giving in to their urges.

The warnings through the ages have been dire: palsied hands, failing eyesight and gibbering idiocy, but the truth is that masturbating is like peeing in a swimming pool: there are two types of people, those who do it and those who lie about not doing it.

Now, the Department of Education is to broach the subject with minds as young as those of Grade 4 pupils as part of life orientation.

Immediately, the twitterati became tumescent.

Predictably, the pithiest came from DA MP Michael Cardo: “78% of Grade 4 learners in SA can’t read for meaning. But the big education story is that we’re going to teach them how to wank. That about sums things up.”

He’d no sooner sniggered on Twitter than we were treated to video footage of a man masturbating in public at a Stellenbosch gym while filming a woman doing squats.

It’s not an isolated case.

In 2011, another man at another Virgin Active gym (an ironic synchronicity) was charged with indecent exposure after he opened a shower stall door and gratified himself in front of the minor showering.

Then there’s the Mr Delivery man who did it in a driveway after handing over a pizza to a customer earlier this year.

That’s just masturbation, almost victimless sex if you like. It doesn’t even begin to encapsulate the full horror of sexual crime, like Collan Rex, the Parktown Boys’ predatory hostel master, now jailed, or Nicholas Minow, still to go on trial of raping a little girl in the toilets of a Dros restaurant.

Far too many other sexual assaults are never reported nor prosecuted; their victims are only known when they end up with a tag around their toe in a state hospital or silently bear the shame and stigma of being cruelly indecently assaulted – all too often by a relative or family friend.

We have a problem in this country. It’s not something that can wait until November for the annual horror show of the 16 Days of No Violence against Women and Children campaign that invariably flushes the freaks and the fiends out of the gloom and into the columns of newspapers.

Polite society might grimace about it, but as the reports show us, this is a national disgrace that cuts across class, creed and colour. It’s certainly not something that should wait until kids are teenagers with raging hormones.

The Education Department is spot on and it’s doing something about it, which we should applaud not denigrate because it involves learning about right and wrong, learning to respect others, their bodies and their dignity – something far too many of us have forgotten, if we ever learnt it at all.

Indeed, it’s a question we should be posing to South Africa’s most high-profile onanist, Malusi Gigaba: “Can you imagine this?”

Ritchie is a media consultant. He is a former journalist and newspaper editor