Government’s mud school eradication initiative ploughs on

South Africa’s Eastern Cape Province is known as the home of legends having spawned the likes of Nelson and Winnie Mandela, Govan and Thabo Mbeki, Walter and Angeline Sisulu, Baleka Mbete and many other liberation struggle icons before, during and after apartheid.

In the democratic era, the province has also been in the news for the mud schools that used to be ubiquitous across its vast landscape. During the apartheid years, pioneering women convinced communities to build schools with their own hands while the struggle continued. Post majority rule and after tackling the massive housing and electricity backlog, the democratic government turned to the question of addressing the education infrastructure backlog via the Accelerated Schools Infrastructure Delivery Initiative, more popularly known in the Eastern Cape by its acronym, ASIDI.

While mud schools in the Eastern Cape dominate the headlines, it is nevertheless true that the programme is national in nature and attempts to eradicate the infrastructure of schools built from “inappropriate material in their entirety” to cite Mr Elijah Mhlanga Chief Director, Media Liaison from the Department of Basic Education.

According to the DBE’s website, this means that the programme encompasses projects of schools built from “plankie” in the Western Cape and asbestos in the Free State, Mpumalanga, Limpopo, North West and Northern Cape Provinces. The initiative also set ambitious targets for the provision of basic services for schools in pursuit of achieving the minimum norms and standards set for schools.

Performance per financial year has not been consistent. The department’s website states that 240 projects have been completed since programme inception in 2011. Government appointed implementing agents decry the physical conditions in the Eastern Cape. A regular refrain in parliamentary portfolio committee hearings and court cases blames the challenging terrain in the province that makes it onerous for suppliers of building material. This presents a new set of challenges which suppliers call double handling, as a result of the need to off load a truck before it can make it to site and then carting off the delivery in smaller quantities to their final destination. During the rainy season, the problem is compounded by the resulting impassable or dangerous roads.

South Africa has a well-documented history of inequality whose effects continue to linger 26 years after majority rule. It follows that previously disadvantaged black contractors are always agitating for a larger slice of the pie. The DBE has previously complained about professional service provider associations’ activism when black contractors who feel deprived of contracts forcibly take occupation of sites and prevent work from carrying on. This, too, has resulted in court action which has led to further delays of project completions. In late 2017, Black contractors represented by three organisations took the DBE to court because, as they alleged, the department excluded them from accessing contracts using high barriers to entry in the tender process.

Implementing Agents rebutted the black contractors’ argument by pointing to Construction Industry Development Board (cidb) regulations regarding the appointment of qualifying contractors and also pointed out that ASIDI was a national programme and, therefore open to every bonafide contractor in the country regardless of geographical location.

cidb Comments

There have been numerous allegations of discrimination in the allocation of projects to contractors in the Eastern Cape. Black contractors, there, complain that they are being left out of projects in favour of “outsiders”; contractors from other provinces. Implementing Agents argue that the allocation is fair based on the cidb grading system for qualifying contractors. We asked the Construction Industry Development Board’s Head of Communications, Kotli Modise, to comment.

Masakheni: How does the grading classification system work? 

KM: The cidb grading system is in place to support macro risk management for public sector clients when procuring infrastructure goods and services. As a macro risk management tool the grading system provides public sector clients with a database of contractors deemed capable of delivering construction projects at different grading levels and in different classes of works.

Masakheni: What level of grading is required by a contractor before they can be awarded a R20 million project?

KM: cidb Grade 6

Masakheni: The building of larger schools requires a higher rating. Does this not discriminate against historically disadvantaged contractors who cannot compete? 

KM: The rand value of the project dictates the minimum grade at which a tender may be awarded, according to Construction Industry Development (CID) Regulations of 2004, as amended. It is illegal for a client to call for a grade lower than the minimum grade mandated by the regulations, for the rand value of the project advertised. The CID Regulations however, do not dictate how clients package projects in terms of size and value. This remains the prerogative of clients who are also accountable for successful delivery of projects and for ensuring that their procurement is in line with Section 17 of the SA Constitution to promote; fairness, openness, equitability, transparency, value for money, and all the other principles espoused by this clause in the Constitution. When packaging projects clients can introduce any developmental strategies based on the project complexity and their risk assessment. Development strategies at their disposal include un-bundling projects, mandatory subcontracting arrangements, use of the Potentially Emerging Status provided for in the CDI Regulations, and term contracts.

Masakheni: What is the cidb doing to help level the field for female black contractors? 

KM: The cidb database of registered contractors provides government and the private sector with information about the nature, size and geographic distribution of all contractors by race, gender and age. This empowers clients to plan and implement policies which support targeted development and empowerment for specific groups. The cidb also supports clients to understand government policy instruments enabling targeted development and empowerment, by capacitating them on these instruments.

Masakheni: What advice do you have for contractors who want to improve their grading level? One of the key enablers for self-empowerment is business and management skills.

KM: The cidb promotes these as one of the key tenants of its development support to the industry. We do so through our Competence Standard for contractors which provides a benchmark for contractors to develop towards, as a bare minimum. Business and management competence supports contractors to develop strategies towards improving their competitiveness, particularly in an industry that is under so much pressure as the construction industry, where there is a dire shortage of work opportunities. Developing a business profile that indicates their specific skills, especially those skills that are usually subcontracted enables smaller contractors to attract opportunities from larger firms and contributes to their growth.

What are implementing agents?

Implementing agent is a term that one comes across often during a parliamentary or from government media releases. We spoke to one in the interests of demystifying some of the terms that leave tax payers confused as to where responsibility lies during the implementation of a project.

Masakheni: What does an IA do?

DBSA: In the case of the ASIDI programme, the DBSA procures professional service providers such as architects and engineers to help design the projects that need to be delivered. We then appoint contractors to execute the work.  In simple terms, we are the managers of the design and ground work. This means we also supervise the work of contractors who build the schools following laid down procedures.

Masakheni: This means you need to have in-house capacity in terms of built-environment skills?

DBSA: Correct. It means we have to boost our internal capacity so that our staff members are able to effectively render a service to our client. This means having the necessary expertise in managing a project cycle from planning, design, procurement all the way through to monitoring a building site to close-out.

Masakheni: There have been complaints by black contractors, in the Eastern Cape in particular, who feel they have been denied opportunities for wealth creation. What are the issues here?

DBSA: Our role is to recruit contractors in keeping with the guidelines that are issued by the Construction Industry Development Board, CIDB. The challenge we have is dealing with contractors who know the same rules, but feel they can somehow circumvent them. While we understand the historical issues relating to their ability to compete in the industry, we cannot afford to ignore the grading requirements that govern who may build a certain size of school by value.

Masakheni: Implementing Agents, in general, have been criticised by the NGO Equal Education for the slow pace of the programme. Care to comment?

DBSA: Well, there are many different factors that lead to projects not being completed on time. You have just asked about the grading of contractors, for example. That issue has led to court action and our work stopping while litigation is on-going. In some cases, our sites have been occupied by protesting associations, leading to a work stoppage. Of course, we can’t speak for other IAs but there are other reasons such as inclement weather, the terrain in the Eastern Cape, state of the roads in the rural areas and poor contractor performance which all combine to negatively impact some projects. We manage contractors and when they fail to perform, we have to follow procedure before we can terminate and replace them. This also tends to have an impact on deadlines. Each province has its peculiar challenges and you will find that projects are completed on time or late for different reasons in different places.

Masakheni:  What other government programmes are you working on as IA?

DBSA: The DBSA works on a myriad of government projects from education, health and energy to give a few examples. DBSA implement programmes and projects for various National, Provincial and Local Government departments.

Note to reader: Implementing agents working on the ASIDI programme include the Coega Development Corporation (CDC), the Development Bank of Southern Africa (DBSA), The Independent Development Trust (IDT), Mhlatuze Water, the Mvula Trust and some government departments such as the Department of Public Works and provincial education departments.