Pretoria – Residents of Merafong in Gauteng will get an opportunity to talk to Social Development Minister Bathabile Dlamini on a number of social concerns affecting their community.
The Minister’s visit to the area on Saturday forms part of her department’s Social Development Month programme.
For the past few weeks, the department’s officials have been conducting extensive consultative engagements with the Merafong community to get an understanding of the challenges they face. Together, they will come up with proposals on how to address them in the short, medium and long term.
Merafong suffers from high levels of poverty caused by unemployment. The majority of those who work are employed by mining companies located near the area.
With the mining sector not doing well due to plunging commodity prices, many of the few employed have been laid off as mines cut costs or close their operations.
“The effects of poverty in the area are taking their toll. Unemployed people are increasingly turning to substance and alcohol abuse as a panacea for their suffering, with unemployed youth said to be keen users of dagga and nyaope.
“As is usually the case in many other communities, the abuse of substances and alcohol leads to acts of criminality (some of which are perpetuated by gangs), the physical abuse of women and children, and irresponsible sexual behaviour, which brings with it unwanted pregnancies and sexually transmitted diseases,” the Social Development Department said.
The community has also complained about lack of services and social facilities such as churches and recreational centres for the youth and elderly.
Minister Dlamini will host the imbizo to see how government can intervene to improve the living conditions of the community.
October is Social Development Month and aims to increase access to and utilisation of social services through direct intervention by building effective service delivery partnerships between government, communities and other role players.
Social Development Month takes place under the auspices of the department’s flagship outreach programme, Project Mikondzo – a service delivery improvement programme aimed at responding quicker, more effectively and innovatively to social challenges in the country. – SAnews.gov.za
