Poor farmer kills himself as standoff delays EU funding
These are some of the devastating casualties in a standoff between the National Treasury and the department of trade & industry
A suicide, massive unpaid loans, desperate and angry unpaid farm workers and heaps of rotting peanuts shrivelling in the sun on prime farmland. These are some of the devastating casualties in a standoff between the National Treasury and the department of trade & industry (DTI) over a R1.5bn donation by the EU to the Employment Creation Fund (ECF). The ECF was created by the South African government in 2010 for employment-creation projects but the funds donated by the EU have not been disbursed to its 31 intended beneficiaries after the Treasury suspended the release of the funds in 2016 because of concerns about governance. But the effects of the deadlock between the two government departments have had catastrophic consequences on the intended beneficiaries, who are mostly rural and poor people. Business Times has established that one of the beneficiaries committed suicide because of crippling debt after he could not secure the ECF funding. This was confirmed by the Treasury this we...
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