Public procurement processes a stumbling block in rolling out public infrastructure
South Africa - PropertyWheel
National Treasury called for public commentary on the Draft Public Procurement Bill in June this year while President Ramaphosa held the inaugural Sustainable Infrastructure Development Symposium (SIDSS). From this, National Minister of Public Works and Infrastructure Patricia de Lille announced 276 projects were aimed to fast track a ‘robust infrastructure pipeline’ purported to set South Africa’s economy back on track and to kickstart the flaying property development and construction industry.
Deon van Zyl, chair of the Western Cape Property Development Forum (WCPDF) believes there is a great deal of expectation from this pipeline to assist in resurrecting the private sector within the property development and construction industry. “Ironically, it is to a large extent, the way in which the public sector has tied up our industry in red tape and legislation for years that has led to the critical situation we are now in. Especially when it comes to procurement, which includes tendering, as well as planning and building approval processes.”
Delivering comment on behalf of the industry against the Draft Public Procurement Bill, the WCPDF notes that while the organisation believes the Bill is a valiant attempt at ensuring that procurement becomes more transparent and uniform across the country, it remains to be seen if the culture of change which the Bill proposes will filter down to local municipal levels where the biggest problems lie.
PropertyWheel
2020 Housing Finance in Africa
South Africa - MDW
2020 Housing Finance in Africa Yearbook just recently launched focused on centrality of housing to a post COVID-19 resilience and recovery strategy.
The COVID-19 pandemic and country lockdowns have brought the state of housing into sharp focus: many households in Africa do not have a home they can comfortably stay in.
This is one of the problems identified in the latest edition of the Housing Finance in Africa Yearbook, launched today by the Centre for Affordable Housing Finance in Africa (CAHF) during the African Union for Housing Finance (AUHF) virtual conference. Decent housing remains out of reach for most people because they cannot afford even the cheapest newly built house by a private sector developer. The World Bank estimates that 40 million people in Africa will be pushed into extreme poverty post COVID.
Our FLISP services are featured in the yearbook. READ MORE & DOWNLOAD THE YEARBOOK…
MDW
October's free LexisNexis Case Law index is available
South Africa - Tech4Law
The October index of the free, online LexisNexis Case Law repository is now available and once again highlights some of the interesting precedent setting cases considered by South Africa’s courts recently.
Among the more high-profile judgments is that of Malawian Christian preacher, Shepherd Bushiri, who sought to interdict the Department of Home Affairs from withdrawing his family’s permanent residence permits and the abeyance of the 30-day period for representations against the withdrawal, pending their criminal trial for fraud and money laundering.
Cases in the Index generally cut across a wide array of legal practice areas, examining complex and often contentious legal concepts.
Tech4Law
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