Godongwana blinks first as frozen municipal billions released

Finance Minister Enoch Godongwana may have tried to play “No more Mister Nice Guy” for a while in freezing municipal equitable share transfers… but, effectively, he blinked first and had to back down.

Announcing yesterday that National Treasury will release R7.1 billion of the frozen money – despite the fact that the errant municipalities and metros had not got their act together in running their finances responsibly – Godongwana bowed to reality.

That reality was the fact that the lack of money meant towns around the country, but especially in ANC heartland provinces, didn’t have enough in the bank to pay workers.

So, another stay of execution was granted, but the finance minister’s warning that they were not yet off the hook will probably fall on deaf ears… as does virtually every other measure taken to hold politicians and civil servants accountable for the current mess which is South Africa.

The freezing of funds has forced payments for basic supplies of electricity and water, but robbing Peter to pay Paul will result only in an accelerated collapse of other services, not to mention that the money is going to have to be found somewhere.

That money will come, inevitably, from ratepayers or national taxpayers.