Cape Town - The South African economy created 712 000 jobs in 2015 – mostly in the agricultural, construction and business sectors, said Ebrahim Patel, Minister of Economic Development.
Patel was the first speaker in the second day of the debate of President Jacob Zuma’s State of the Nation address.
“Unlike opposition parties who resort to schoolboy tactics, the ANC rightly focuses on the economy. The new global economic context has a profound impact on South Africa and we need to step up efforts and organised labour to create jobs and heal factious relationships.”
According to Patel, government spent altogether R290bn on infrastructure in the past year. “This translates to more than R1bn every working day.”
The R1bn per day expenditure, Patel said, helped to build three new technical colleges and two new universities, connected close to 300 000 homes to the electricity grid and repaired 24 000 km of roads.
“Behind these numbers are South Africans whose lives were improved. A total of 200 000 workers are now employed on government’s public infrastructure programme. This helped millions of people in townships and suburbs to experience change in their lives.
“It’s not a headline in the newspaper, but it transform lives,” Patel concluded.
Patel was the first speaker in the second day of the debate of President Jacob Zuma’s State of the Nation address.
“Unlike opposition parties who resort to schoolboy tactics, the ANC rightly focuses on the economy. The new global economic context has a profound impact on South Africa and we need to step up efforts and organised labour to create jobs and heal factious relationships.”
According to Patel, government spent altogether R290bn on infrastructure in the past year. “This translates to more than R1bn every working day.”
The R1bn per day expenditure, Patel said, helped to build three new technical colleges and two new universities, connected close to 300 000 homes to the electricity grid and repaired 24 000 km of roads.
“Behind these numbers are South Africans whose lives were improved. A total of 200 000 workers are now employed on government’s public infrastructure programme. This helped millions of people in townships and suburbs to experience change in their lives.
“It’s not a headline in the newspaper, but it transform lives,” Patel concluded.