Note to Editors: Click here for a video, by Dr Roy Jankielsohn MPL, DA Leader of the Official Opposition in the Free State Legislature.
Funds for agricultural projects in the Free State have been plundered by implementing agents and now the infrastructure is being plundered by desperate beneficiaries.
The Diyatalawa Agri Village between Harrismith and Kestell in the Free State is a symbol of Magashule’s legacy of broken dreams and loss of hope for beneficiaries of his Hlasela campaign. The project was launched by President Jacob Zuma as one of his Comprehensive Rural Development Projects in 2009 which he also visited in 2011. At the time, the former Premier Ace Magashule hailed this R150 million project as his Operation Hlasela flagship project in the Free State. The DA requested investigations by both the Public Protector and the SIU regarding implementing agents on the project which were abandoned by the investigating bodies due to the loss of documents and records of transactions in the Department of Agriculture and Rural Development.
The project was supported by various government departments over a number of financial years with the following:
• 50 housing units with solar panels.
• A crèche, school and a hostel.
• 950 hectares of arable land.
• 1092 hectares of grazing land.
• 100 hectares of cultivated pastures.
• A nonsensical and unusable R600 000 guardhouse and devils fork gate that was built by the company Rekgonne that is involved in a R245 million corruption scandal in the Free State Department of Agriculture and Rural Development.
• Eight hectares of apples under shade nets that was meant to produce a livelihood for 20 youth beneficiaries.
• The training of three young people in India.
• 40 hectares of fodder under irrigation by three pivots.
• A fully equipped R15 million dairy.
• And various deliveries of both dairy and beef cattle.
The recent annual oversight visit by the DA to the project indicates that the project has collapsed totally with only some subsistence based beneficiary based activities, very few cattle on site, the nets of the apple orchard completely destroyed, the dairy being plundered and in a state of decay, the guardhouse plundered and the arable lands are being hired out to a local commercial farmer to generate some income for the remaining 30 beneficiaries.
It is sad that once again the hopes and dreams of a better life for beneficiaries have been destroyed by the ANC-run government in the Free State. The communist collective farming approach with large numbers of beneficiaries requiring livelihoods does not work in a water scarce and drought prone country in which even family farms are struggling to survive. The DA’s oversight visits to projects have yet to expose one that is sustainable and functioning independently without government support.
The ANC’s failures in the Free State have cost the people of the province billions of Rands over the last 25 years with no tangible economic benefits for beneficiaries or local communities. The DA will continue to expose these failures and hold the politicians responsible for this accountable in the Legislature. The DA’s alternative plan for government in the Free State promotes economic models that will benefit all our people in the province by creating an enabling environment for investment, job creation and economic development in rural communities.