After months of protracted discussions with the Press Ombudsman and the Daily Dispatch the CDC is pleased to announce that the Press Ombudsman has found in the favour of the CDC.
After a meeting of the Coega Development Corporation and the Daily Dispatch presided over by Press Ombudsman, Mr. Johan Retief on March 22, 2017 regarding newspaper articles by Mike Loewe, Chief Editor of the Daily Dispatch, published in the Daily Dispatch on 2 February 2017, it has been found that these articles were angled to mislead the Daily Dispatch readers in reference to the Coega IDZ. The Daily Dispatch published that …
“…Last year, the government announced that the billion – rand OEM plant, designated for the ELIDZ, was going to the Coega IDZ in Nelson Mandela Bay and would be developed and run by China’s FAW Corporation…”
Therefore, this statement presented as facts was incorrect and the word “designated” for EL IDZ was misleading.
Coega emerged a clear frontrunner and ultimate winner in the multi-site race to host the R600 million FAW and R11 billion BAIC investments after a detailed site assessment involving various IDZs in the country. It was acknowledged by the Daily Dispatch that there was no intention on the part of the reporter to sow the seed that Coega’s behaviour in this deal was somehow untoward but the use of “designated for the ELIDZ..” was both inaccurate and misleading. Coega has accepted the ruling of the Press Ombudsman, Mr. Johan Retief. The organization has further accepted the apology by the newspaper, said Dr Ayanda Vilakazi, CDC’s Head of Marketing, Brand and Corporate Communications.
The CDC would like to reiterate one of its key founding values of INTEGRITY that the organisation is based on global good governance and acceptable business principles. The findings by the Press Ombudsman affirms the long held position of the CDC in conducting its business with stakeholders based on transparency of business processes and sincerity in dealing with investors and potential investors.
With 36 operational investors, 7 176 factory jobs (to exceed 10,000 by the end of 2019) and private investment in excess of R6,4 billion (to exceed 18 billion by the end of 2019), the Coega IDZ is South Africa’s foremost investment hotspot and preferred investment location in Africa, especially for industries with a global perspective; it also strives to improve the lives of millions of people of the Eastern Cape through investment promotion and the delivery of infrastructure in the Eastern Cape by addressing skill shortages, unemployment, constrained planning and project management capacity and under-expenditure.
The CDC is pressing on even stronger, since April 2016, the CDC has signed 13 new investors against a target of 7 – 186% ahead of target. This would bring the investment value for the current financial year to R11, 817 billion – 1 032% ahead of the target of R1, 145 billion. Another six projects are in the pipeline and may be signed by the end of the financial year. Coega IDZs success was also acknowledged by the Vice President of the People’s Republic of China in his state visit to South Africa in November 2016, where he said “I’ve been to many developing countries and industrial development zones in the world; the Coega IDZ is by far the best of them all.” Dr LI Yuanchao, Vice President of the People’s Republic of China, concludes Dr Ayanda Vilakazi.
Alan Straton
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