December 11, 2006
By Anish Abraham
A GROUP of senior officials from Addis Ababa is in Johannesburg for two weeks to learn more about the City's administration and governance.
The 10-man delegation from the Ethiopian capital, headed by the city manager, Wubishet Berhanu, consists of senior officials from city functions such as city planning, land development, information and documentation services, health, education and capacity building. It is being hosted by the Joburg Innovation and Knowledge Exchange (Jike).
The two cities' relationship stems from the Joburg – Addis Ababa Partnership Programme, or Jaapp, which has been in place since 2003. Since then, senior political and administrative officials from both sides have made several trips between the two cities.
The Ethiopian delegation, with Addis Ababa City Manager, Dr Wubishet Berhanu, left
The partnership is funded by the World Bank's cities alliance unit and is set to run until June 2007. However, both parties are keen to extend it. Addis Ababa is being helped to fulfill its commitment to the partnership through the German Corporation for Technical Co-operation (GTZ), a federal agency that helps in capacity building in the government sphere.
"Unlike Johannesburg it [Addis Ababa] does not always have the necessary financial or human resources, so we assist it in those areas," said the GTZ's Andreas Lindner, who is assigned to the project.
Sharing knowledge
To fulfill its vision of becoming a world-class African city by 2030, Johannesburg has formed partnerships and twinning agreements with several other cities to share knowledge, experiences and best practice.
"Such a partnership forms part of our co-operative governance project, where we look for best practice, lessons learned and innovative case studies," said Harvey Phalatse, a specialist in knowledge services and the acting director at Jike.
The delegation will be in Johannesburg for two weeks; the Ethiopians will visit several city departments and municipal-owned entities. They will also go on sightseeing tours of Soweto and Alexandra.
To ensure the knowledge shared during such meetings is not lost, Jike will record the discussions. Interviews with senior officials will also be video taped.
"After this sharing of knowledge between the cities there is the need at the end to come up with a document describing what things have been learned through the partnership," said Jean Jacques Mbayo, an acting specialist for knowledge management and innovation at Jike. "This information can then be used to benefit both ourselves and others."
Berhanu is confident that the high-powered delegation has much to learn from the administration of the City of Johannesburg, while there is also room for his team to give the locals some advice.
First impressions
Though he has been in South Africa before, this is Berhanu's first visit to the city of gold.
"I am very impressed by the City, especially in terms of urban management and development. The inner city redevelopment is well organised and we have a lot to learn. The Addis Ababa central district developed informally and we have to redevelop it now," he said.
The delegation was also impressed with the strict zoning laws in Joburg, which regulate where and how development can take place, unlike the arbitrary development taking place in Addis Ababa.
That Johannesburg was "so green" and sparsely populated struck the visitors, unlike the dusty and crowded streets of Addis Ababa. In addition, Berhanu said differences between land usage were very distinct in Johannesburg; commercial, retail, residential, rich and poor were all found side by side in his city.
The two cities shared some of the same challenges, he said, the familiar one being that of low quality service delivery, especially concerning solid waste management. Johannesburg seemed clean by their standards and the delegation got much information out of a visit to a Pikitup landfill and compost site.
"The composting site was very interesting – recycling is very good resource utilisation and we will look into some of these methods back home," Berhanu said.
Another area that the visitors are interested in is Joburg's efforts to combat HIV/Aids, including its voluntary counselling and testing programmes, community-based care groups and the provision of antiretrovirals.
The delegation visited Soweto on 9 December, and Berhanu said it was one of the highlights of the trip. His team was keen to see how Johannesburg had improved service delivery to the township, including expanding roads and installing water pipelines, sewerage and electricity.
"When it comes to the amount of resources available, we do not have resources like Johannesburg. But there are still a lot of things we can take back with us to try to implement back there," he said.
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