How reimagining the Public Works portfolio can drive South Africa's economic growth

Public Works can and must become an enabler of state renewal and inclusive economic growth.

For far too long, the Department of Public Works and Infrastructure (DPWI), has been synonymous with state capture and corruption. Ministers have come and gone and the rot has continued. Yet this portfolio with decisive interventions, can help turn South Africa into a construction site, creating jobs and unlocking badly needed economic growth. This was a vision first outlined by President Nelson Mandela and one that must be pursued by government led by President Cyril Ramaphosa and the African National Congress.

A reimagining of this portfolio is all the more pressing with the economy barely averaging 1% annual growth over the past 15 years, unemployment a ticking time bomb at 43.1% and the fiscus facing a long list of equally pressing needs.

For this to happen, DPWI needs to be cleansed of the cancer of state capture. Politicians, business people and officials involved in corruption must be removed and made to face the law. To deal with corruption lifestyle audits by the South African Revenue Services and Special Investigations Unit must be deployed to such persons of influence.

Transparent procurement processes for the leasing of properties are needed as per the now assented to Public Procurement Act. Its promulgation and Regulations need to be expedited.

The government must ensure the long-promised asset registry of all state property is completed and made available to the public. A cleansed and renewed DPWI needs to reimagine its role as the nation’s leading property owner, but one tasked by Parliament and the Constitution to driving the nation’s transformation and inclusive economic growth.

It needs to play its part in freeing state property for economic infrastructure investments, be it land to build roads to reduce traffic congestion or to overhaul aging water infrastructure, to rolling out electricity transmission lines (especially in the three Cape Provinces rich with renewable energy potential, to expanding port facilities and thus boosting our export industries (in particular mining, agriculture and manufacturing), to securing passenger and freight railway lines and thus making it faster and cheaper for commuters and goods to reach their destinations, or to availing land for schools, colleges and universities to enable more young people to acquire the education and skills needed to find work.

DPWI needs to play its part in being the state’s property agent. The state is naturally the largest employer in the economy and requires land and buildings to fulfill its responsibilities, yet the state is spending billions of Rands renting expensive properties across the country. This is despite countless state buildings and land standing empty, and in many cases, sites of criminal activities and illegal occupation. Often politicians and property owners have a vested interest in this as money is to be made off expensive leases with bribes to be collected.

This tragedy has a human face. In the Western Cape in 2024 2 407 teachers were retrenched in 2024, yet the same provincial government is spending millions each month renting office space in Cape Town whilst provincial buildings are available! This crisis is replicated across the country. Billions can be saved and be better used to employ doctors, nurses, teachers and police officers.

DPWI needs to play a progressive role availing property for housing, in particular for low income, single mothers, poorly paid public servants, for domestic workers to be close to their workplaces, in inner cities and to help deracialise still largely segregated communities. This can help boost the amount of public housing for the poor the state is able to provide.

A modernised DPWI that knows what the state owns can be better placed to lease property it doesn’t currently require for residential or commercial purposes. This can be done through the Public Investment Corporation, which has extensive experience in property management and rental income. This revenue can ease the burden on a badly overstretched fiscus and release funds for pressing needs including fixing leaking water pipes in townships, reducing Eskom’s debt burden and providing capital for farm workers to become farmers.

A DPWI in touch with what it owns, can support the Departments of Trade, Industry and Competition as well as Small Business Development, by releasing and letting land and properties for SMMEs, industrial and commercial development. Land near residential neighbourhoods, in particular rural towns, townships and informal areas can attract economic investments and jobs near where working-class communities live, inject new life and secondary economic activities there and saving workers money spent on transport.

The state is estimated to own 30% of South Africa’s land yet there is a pressing need for land to be released for farm workers and labour tenants to call their own, for residents of informal areas to build homes and to unlock the development of SMMEs in townships. In the midst of the fake news and deliberate distortions of what the Expropriation Act contains, one of the key motivations for nil compensation has been lost in the public discourse.

The state is not a single homogenous organ. It’s spread across hundreds of national and provincial departments, entities, municipalities and State-Owned enterprises. All too often these state institutions neglect and do not utilise their property until its release is requested by another department for housing or other needs. The affected state institution then agrees to sell it for market related compensation to the same government! It makes no sense why a financially cash-strapped state must compensate the same state for land needed for the public good! Yet this has happened in the past and hence the need for the Expropriation Act to fix this.

A crisis provides an opportunity to fix what has been broken and neglected for far too long. A capacitated DPWI, can become a site of victory over state capture and corruption, an enabler of economic growth and decent jobs, a supporter of public housing and infrastructure, and a source of revenue for state needing funds to address our many dire socio-economic challenges.

Cosatu President Zingiswa Losi

*** The views expressed here do not necessarily represent those of Independent Media or IOL.

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