WITH the political wrangling of the past few months now officially behind him, provincial premier Phumulo Masualle has been urged to roll up his sleeves and get the province working again.
Masualle was sworn in as premier last week and yesterday ended his first full week in office.
At his cabinet meeting on Wednesday he assigned his MECs to head the different cluster committees.
He has already met his senior management team and had individual sessions with them.
Tomorrow he will attend a prayer meeting in East London.
He also used his first week to look over his incoming tray.
But organised business, political parties and analysts with a keen interest in the province this week said they expected the Eastern Cape’s sixth premier since 1994 to concentrate on job creation, developing rural areas, health and education.
On top of his “to do list” for the start of his five-year term should be a renewed push for clean governance, a commitment to fight corruption in the provincial administration and bringing stability in the local government sphere.
Political analyst Dr Somadoda Fikeni even suggested that Masualle must consider approaching the national government to ask for senior government officials to be deployed as municipal managers or engineers.
“If you go to other provinces, the human capital from the province is doing wonders, winning awards globally,” Fikeni said, adding that one of his immediate tasks should be finding the right mayoral candidate and bringing stability to the Nelson Mandela Metro.
“In PE you will have to get a stronger mayor than the one that may have been stronger in his younger days. There is another factor which we are not paying attention to. It is that Numsa’s base is the NMM. The spillovers of what is happening in Cosatu and the stance that Numsa has taken, no matter by how much, may have had an impact,” Fikeni said.
The different political parties represented in the provincial legislature agreed.
Minority party leader Themba Wele of the Economic Freedom Fighters said they wanted Masualle to deal with corruption within provincial government. “ ensure that the elderly are kept safe from harm,” Wele said.
The African Independent Congress’s Vuyisile Krakri said the poor infrastructure in rural areas made them inaccessible. “ people (who) still travel more than 50km to access health facilities,” Krakri said.
The Congress of the People’s Lievie Sharpley said government needed to promote community gardens and create a market where small farmers could sell their produce.
Democratic Alliance provincial leader Athol Trollip said Masualle needed to look into economic growth led by the private sector and foreign investment, rather than the state-led Expanded Public works Programme.
“Government needs to incentivise job creation through various initiatives to address unemployment, or else we will continue to haemorrhage human resources to the Western Cape and Gauteng,” he said.
Border-Kei Chamber of Commerce would like to see a new high school being built in East London. “No new schools have been built for decades, and now schools are full – with no space for children of investors,” the chamber’s executive director, Les Holbrook, said.
Government spokesman Nomfanelo Kota said the premier would spend the coming week meeting his executive team and aligning the ANC’s election manifesto with government programme.
“It is only then that we can safely say what his priorities are for his term in office,” Kota said.
Premier gets a heads up on priorities issues
Masualle was sworn in as premier last week and yesterday ended his first full week in office.
At his cabinet meeting on Wednesday he assigned his MECs to head the different cluster committees.
He has already met his senior management team and had individual sessions with them.
Tomorrow he will attend a prayer meeting in East London.
He also used his first week to look over his incoming tray.
But organised business, political parties and analysts with a keen interest in the province this week said they expected the Eastern Cape’s sixth premier since 1994 to concentrate on job creation, developing rural areas, health and education.
On top of his “to do list” for the start of his five-year term should be a renewed push for clean governance, a commitment to fight corruption in the provincial administration and bringing stability in the local government sphere.
Political analyst Dr Somadoda Fikeni even suggested that Masualle must consider approaching the national government to ask for senior government officials to be deployed as municipal managers or engineers.
“If you go to other provinces, the human capital from the province is doing wonders, winning awards globally,” Fikeni said, adding that one of his immediate tasks should be finding the right mayoral candidate and bringing stability to the Nelson Mandela Metro.
“In PE you will have to get a stronger mayor than the one that may have been stronger in his younger days. There is another factor which we are not paying attention to. It is that Numsa’s base is the NMM. The spillovers of what is happening in Cosatu and the stance that Numsa has taken, no matter by how much, may have had an impact,” Fikeni said.
The different political parties represented in the provincial legislature agreed.
Minority party leader Themba Wele of the Economic Freedom Fighters said they wanted Masualle to deal with corruption within provincial government. “ ensure that the elderly are kept safe from harm,” Wele said.
The African Independent Congress’s Vuyisile Krakri said the poor infrastructure in rural areas made them inaccessible. “ people (who) still travel more than 50km to access health facilities,” Krakri said.
The Congress of the People’s Lievie Sharpley said government needed to promote community gardens and create a market where small farmers could sell their produce.
Democratic Alliance provincial leader Athol Trollip said Masualle needed to look into economic growth led by the private sector and foreign investment, rather than the state-led Expanded Public works Programme.
“Government needs to incentivise job creation through various initiatives to address unemployment, or else we will continue to haemorrhage human resources to the Western Cape and Gauteng,” he said.
Border-Kei Chamber of Commerce would like to see a new high school being built in East London. “No new schools have been built for decades, and now schools are full – with no space for children of investors,” the chamber’s executive director, Les Holbrook, said.
Government spokesman Nomfanelo Kota said the premier would spend the coming week meeting his executive team and aligning the ANC’s election manifesto with government programme.
“It is only then that we can safely say what his priorities are for his term in office,” Kota said.
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