June 19, 2006
By Ndaba Dlamini
THE provincial department of local government has announced a budget of R210-million for the financial year 2006/7, a 63 percent increase from last year's allocation.
A large portion of this amount is to be allocated to the construction of a provincial disaster management centre, bearing in mind the preparation needed for South Africa to host the 2010 Fifa World Cup.
Announcing her budget in the Gauteng Legislature on Thursday, 15 June, MEC for local government Qedani Mahlangu said: "We recognise that with the 2010 World Cup and our day-to-day responsibilities to protect our citizens, disaster management is a crucial component of local government priorities."
The province last year developed a disaster management plan and drew up a disaster management centre framework and model.
Some R45-million will be used over a two-year period (R20-million for 2006/7 and R20-million for 2007/8) towards establishing and building such a centre. "Municipalities have been brought on board and discussions are ongoing with the department of roads, transport and public works," she added.
The department of local government is determined to cut poverty and unemployment by half by 2014, said Mahlangu. "We want to realise universal access to basic services [such as water, sanitation and electricity], improve the quality of municipal services especially for the poor, eradicate bucket toilets by 2006 and tar all roads by 2009."
Some of the key projects highlighted in the budget include:
20 townships
Earlier this year Gauteng premier Mbhazima Shilowa announced that R3-billion would be invested in 20 priority townships "to build better communities and upgrade local social and economic infrastructure".
Mahlangu said her department, in partnership with the Gauteng department of housing, will assist municipalities develop special IDPs for these townships. "Such IDPs will assist in ensuring that the envisaged development and investment in those townships is done within an integrated framework."
This meant that Municipal Infrastructure Grant (MIG) funds would need to be used for the project. "For the current financial year R330-million will be invested from MIG funds to upgrade these townships," the MEC said
HIV and Aids
Mahlangu said the Local Government Performance Review has identified major gaps in how local government responds to HIV and Aids. An amount of R22-million has been allocated to improve these interventions in the current financial year.
The department will also hold a two-day Municipal HIV and Aids Indaba at the end of June, in partnership with the Multi-sectoral Aids Unit, with 450 participants, ranging from municipal to civil society representatives.
Municipal support programme
The provincial department of local government has also launched a new programme to support local governments across Gauteng to deliver services, improve infrastructure development and become financially viable.
To this end, the department of local government has allocated R50-million to the municipal support programme.
"The overriding objective of this plan is to ensure that district and local municipalities are brought up to the required standard that enable them to deliver basic services, improve infrastructure development and become financially viable," Mahlangu said.
Over the next three years, the programme will focus on supporting municipalities to develop integrated development plans (IDPs), improve the billing system and project management capacity building towards developing specialised skills in local government.
Mahlangu said her department's specific focus is to expand and grow the technical, financial and institutional capacity of municipalities in a sustainable manner and assist with interventions that will enable municipalities to become financially viable.
As part of ongoing support to municipalities, Mahlangu said her department is working together with the South African Institute of Civil Engineers. Senior engineers have been deployed to various local municipalities to undertake a variety of projects including capital project management to accelerate the delivery of infrastructure, addressing critical operational and management issues including improving water quality and addressing sewerage spillage problems.
Electricity
In April this year, the department co-hosted an electricity summit with the Electricity Distribution Industry (EDI) Holdings where the department outlined what it will do to facilitate the establishment of six regional electricity distributors (REDS) countrywide, three of which will be in Gauteng. Recently, cabinet decided on the establishment of a seventh national RED.
However, Mahlangu said electricity restructuring has to be done in such a way that it does not impact negatively on the finances of municipalities and that it happens within the framework of economic development priorities.
"I can proudly say that metros are ready to roll out the REDS, especially Ekurhuleni and the City of Johannesburg. There is a need to assist Tshwane Metro to move at the same pace with other metros to prepare for the implementation and roll out of the REDS."
Community workers
As part of government's plan "to deepen democracy and to speed up service delivery", Mahlangu said R61-million has been allocated to support the ongoing community development workers programme.
"The role of the community development workers is to strengthen co-ordination and interaction of service delivery at the local level and improve people's access to government's service delivery and information."
She said 198 community development workers were deployed last year and 319 are doing an intensive learnership programme at Unisa. They will be deployed next year.
Already these workers had managed to help the community access social grants and identity documents, housing problems, as well as assisting with voter education, awareness and registration campaigns.
Sanitation
The department had committed itself to eradicate all the 12 332 identified buckets by the end of June 2006 "in order to give people the dignity they deserve", said Mahlangu.
She said the department had managed to eradicate 11 500 identified bucket systems in various settlements around Gauteng and replace them with ventilated improved pit-latrines (VIPs).
"We envisage that all the remaining projects will be completed by the end of the year. We are confident that we will fulfil our mandate of eradicating all the bucket toilets in the province."
Finances
A financial advisory committee on municipal finances, set up last year to assist the department in dealing with the financial challenges of municipalities, has started its work. Mahlangu said the committee's work will support municipalities to comply with the Municipal Financial Management Act.
Local government debt in the province currently stands at R17-billion and the department is working with municipalities in developing strategies to deal with this, said Mahlangu. A lack of payment hampered service delivery and it was imperative municipalities recover the money owed to them, she added.
"Municipalities should enforce their credit control measures and to name and shame defaulters especially big businesses and those masquerading as the poorest-of-the-poor," she said.
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