By: Staff Reporter
Human Settlements, Water and Sanitation Minister Lindiwe Sisulu has called on engineers to patriotically contribute to the development agenda of the country.
Sisulu made this call while delivering a keynote address at a breakfast hosted by the National Society of Black Engineers (NSBE) in Midrand on Friday (18 June).
Sisulu addressed members of the NSBE on the Role of Local Engineers in the execution of the National Water & Sanitation Master Plan.
“Today’s global challenges such as climate change and the Covid-19 pandemic require engineering minds that would offer ground-breaking solutions aimed at accelerating economic recovery,” said Sisulu
She added that the country needed engineers that would take a lead in realising “our vision of new human settlements that provide housing and comfort to our people, engineers that will help change the spatial orientation of apartheid cities and towns”.
Addressing the issue of shoddy workmanship, Sisulu implored members of the NSBE to shy away from corruption, not sign off poorly constructed infrastructure projects and not bow to pressure to compromise technically-sound decisions.
Speaking on behalf of the engineers, president of the NSBE, Mdu Mlaba said they had noted with interest the drive by the Department of Human Settlements to procure some of the properties from the State-Owned entities such as Eskom and Transnet. Mlaba said their engineers and project managers were ready to partner with government to convert these buildings into decent and affordable social housing units for people living in the cities.
Mlaba also conveyed his organization’s commitment to work with government as it embarked on finding lasting solutions to water and sanitation challenges in Emfuleni Local Municipality.
Other topics discussed included work readiness of South Africa’s engineering graduates, the role of the NSBE in the socio-economic transformation of the country and investment in water and sanitation infrastructure.
