NEDC ipelegeng programme spends over P8million

Barati Mathambo
Correspondent | Saturday May 25, 2013 00:00

NEDC Ipelegeng Programme coordinator, Limit Manewe addressed councillors at a full council meeting held on Tuesday in Masunga and said that the amount was spent on various projects which included Green Scorpion, feeding funds and running costs of the office.'At the moment we are having a balance of P2 604,011 and in addition we have received P1 419,271 to cater for additional beneficiaries therefore this has pushed our budget to be P13 004,503,' he said.

Manewe said that the 140 projects being undertaken include the fencing of a dam in Botalaote, which commenced last year in October after land allocation by Tati Land Board.'Forty-nine projects have been completed, 27 projects are between 79 and 99 percent complete, three are at between 51 and 75 percent complete and two are at 26 to 50 percent complete. Fifty-nine pure labour projects are on-going and these include road sweeping and litter picking,' he told the council.He stated that through all these projects they have managed to generate income for NEDC residents after a lot of people were hired.

'In the 2012/13 financial year, we had the largest turnout of workers as compared to year 2011/2012. We have managed to engage 12 114 people, accounting for a number of 10 093 females and 2 021 and amongst the figure there are 2 798 female and 700 male youths,' said Manewe.He continued to say that the Green Scorpion is catering for 1 149 people composed of 1 095 females and 54 males.'Another Feeding project is also on-going and 479 suppliers have been engaged and they are made up of 468 females and 11 males who supply food to 43 villages within the district,' he said.

Manewe told the council that this component has so far used P717 166 out of P894 240 and that on August 1 2012 the feeding fee was increased to P3.00 per person per day and this increased by 50thebe within the budget since inception.'Looking at the employment figures, the villages that have the highest turnout of workers are Masunga, Tati-siding followed by Matshelagabedi because the three respective villages have the highest populations,' he said.He said looking at the figures, females are more keen towards the  Ipelegeng Programme and this shows that women are more patient whereas men prefer going for the jobs that pay more.

'Again following the increase of beneficiaries in December 2012, P700 000 was allocated to our district for minor maintenance and small projects hence procurement of material and the engagement of skills are on-going,' said Manewe.He said that though their projects are running well they are faced with a couple of challenges, which include the slow delivery of materials and the delivery of poor quality material, by other suppliers.'These poor quality material always end up being returned to NEDC since they did not meet the standard and again we are faced with people in some villages that are not cooperative. 'The people are always lagging behind in some of the projects as they cannot work without being supervised,' he said.Lastly he said that another worrisome situation included the breaking down of vehicles, which have to be repaired regularly as they are old.