#TshwaneFightingUnemployment: 3232 beneficiaries selected in 1st EPWP lottery

18 December 2017

Note to editor: This is the statement made by the Executive Mayor of Tshwane, Solly Msimanga, during a press conference held today at Tshwane House.

Today I oversaw a lottery of over 3000 beneficiaries for Expanded Public Works Programme work opportunities in the city. The lottery comes after I led a city-wide recruitment drive that saw 120 683 registering on our central database.

Today’s lottery includes those members previously known as “Vat Alles”. They will now be formerly known as “Gata Le Nna”. This loosely translates to “Walk with me”.

The reformed EPWP recruitment policy framework was passed by Council on 28 September 2017 as a principle of ‘Good Governance’ that was adopted by the DA-led multiparty administration as one of its strategic priorities, which requires the Tshwane leadership to continuously consult with their communities in the law making and governance related programmes.

One of the proposed amendments to the revised policy includes the registration of eligible EPWP beneficiaries on a Central Database, with beneficiaries selected through an open and audited lottery-like system.

This random selection is open to public observation and such selection process will also be published in advance in the Wards and Regions from which the EPWP beneficiaries will be recruited.

I am pleased to see that after we have registered over 120 000 residents onto our EPWP database, today we conduct the first digital lottery system to demonstrate that beneficiaries are indeed selected at random and not on the basis of prejudicial reasons as in the past.

This process will see the fair and equitable recruitment of EPWP work opportunities so that the burden of poverty, inequality and unemployment may be alleviated to some measure.

The table below indicate the numbers required per Region and per ward:

Total number per region:

The EPWP Selection Process

The Executive Mayor will not do a manual selection process hence a random selection by the system using variables such as region, ward, skill set, gender, age or disability

Please note that there will not be a re-run of the lottery report hence there is need to be guided by the following analogy which should be used as a yardstick to the selection process.

Let’s take a case of 55% males= 1650 (0.55*3000)

STEP 1

Run the lottery report. On the variables enter the number of beneficiaries as 1650. You may add other variables as explained above. Explicitly indicate gender as ‘MALE’.

The result of the report (1650) beneficiaries will be displayed on the report and will be downloaded into excel with their contacts for further engagements.

STEP 2

Let us take a case of 45% females =1350 (0.45*3000)

Run the lottery report. On the variables enter the number of beneficiaries as 1350. You may add other variables as explained above. Explicitly indicate gender as ‘FEMALE’

The result of the report (1350) beneficiaries will be displayed on the report and will be downloaded into excel with their contacts for further engagements.

The Expanded Public Works Programme (EPWP) is a national initiative aimed at reducing unemployment and alleviating poverty through the creation of short-term work opportunities through the use of labour-intensive methods.

Gone are the days where EPWP opportunities were handed out to hand-picked beneficiaries. From now on, recruitment and appointment would be on a fair and transparent basis the likes of which Tshwane has never seen before.

The City of Tshwane firmly believes that these reforms will win back the trust of communities, which was lost by the previous administration’s disastrous handling of public works job opportunities.

Statement issued by Samkelo Mgobozi, Spokesperson to the Executive Mayor of Tshwane, 18 December 2017