Picture: North West Premier, Supra Mahumapelo

NORTH West Premier Supra Mahumapelo said his visited to China and India last month was an accomplishment. Mahumapelo said they will strengthen business opportunities with those countries.

“One of the agreements of business partnership was donkey business. The Chinese have capabilities in making use of donkey skin in different ways. They have the biggest Science Complex where they use it to deal with donkey skin to boost the economy. We have already identified few hectares where we will open a factory to deal with donkey skin business. We have reached an agreement that we will not send the donkey meat and skin abroad, but open a factory instead.  

“Our National Transport Investment (NTI) also engaged with Chinese government to discuss the possibilities of opening a bus factory. We will work together with all stakeholders in transport industry including taxi industry. We want to upgrade infrastructure especially in far-flung areas. The Chinese agreed to provide necessary training to our people by imparting skills,” he said.

Mahumapelo added that people need to have access to free Wi-Fi across the province. He further said they will also identify few youth who will be ferried to China, Brazil, Russia and India to be equipped with training.

“All those who will be identified, they will to go and get training abroad through BRICS countries. They will also learn the languages used in those countries. We will encourage them to visit our province frequently so that they can share their expertise while studying,” he said.

Mahumapelo said their main objectives were to eradicate unemployment, inequality and poverty which are triple challenges. Most community members need to have cooperatives to be employers rather than employees. We are targeting 70% of our youth to be employers instead.

“We will make announcement next year in 2017 regarding the deal. We also went to India to negotiate with them. The Indian economy is the most and fastest growing economy in the world thus far. They also have good infrastructure in agriculture. We have invited water specialists from India to come and assist us in addressing water challenges.

“The province has experienced water shortage through drought last year. We believe that our farmers will also benefit from that deal. They will educate them on how to reach underground water without spending more money. The Indians are using the easiest method to water their plantation too. They also have magical trees that make rain to fall and have water recycling methods through technology,” Mahumapelo said.

“We will be working closely with law enforcement authorities to address donkey-theft. We also want to applaud the police on arresting those who were involved in drugs selling in the province. We also want to highlight that most of our public servants are doing a great job. However, there are some of those who are involved in corruption and fraud. Their actions derail service delivery and we requested Provincial Government Director-General, Lydia Sebego to address that.

“Our province has reduced its wasteful expenditure from R900 million to only under R10 million currently. We have agreed with Audit General to apply PFMA and we will take drastic measures against those who found guilty. We have also completed the qualifications audit investigations,” Mahumapelo said.- Newsnote