Gauteng has gone from health crisis to economic crisis, Makhura highlights in SOPA address

GAUTENG has moved from a public health emergency to an economic and service delivery emergency, Gauteng Premier David Makhura said during his State of the Province Address, in Johannesburg, on February 21.

“As we steadily work our way out of the shadow of the Covid-19 pandemic, we should show urgency and act with the same speed and agility to tackle the crisis of unemployment, rebuild and protect our infrastructure for basic services and fight crime and corruption in an emergency mode,” he implored.

Makhura insisted that government departments should no longer work in silos, stressing that inter-departmental and inter-governmental cooperation were required to achieve change on the scale required.

“The collapse of infrastructure for basic services also requires an emergency response akin to the way we dealt with the Covid-19 public health emergency,” he said, adding that “all hands on deck” were required to turn the situation around.

Makhura revealed that the Gauteng provincial government had established a Provincial War Room, in which government and industry leaders