Mashatile: How national government is aiming to reform local municipalities

National government is promoting new reforms as it begins a reimagining of the way municipalities function.

Deputy President Paul Mashatile addressed the National Assembly on Thursday, where he fielded multiple questions on local government reform.

The question-and-answer session followed President Cyril Ramaphosa’s speech on Wednesday, in which he launched phase two of Operation Vulindlela, a grand economic growth vision.

Operation Vulindlela

One of the facets of Operation Vulindlela is optimising municipal performance, as Mashatile stated that municipal mismanagement hinders growth.

In September, a task team was formed to establish a financial recovery plan, beginning with the 10 worst municipalities in the country.

The municipalities chosen feature widespread failures, and they have required provincial or national intervention on multiple occasions over the last decade.

Including the Ditsobotla, Emfuleni, Mafube and Maluti-a-Phofung local municipalities, these 10 are being used as a test case for municipal reform.

Mashatile stated that so far, eight of the 10 municipalities had held meeting with the task team and are working on their turnaround strategies.

Revised funding and operating model

Mashatile explained that Operation Vulindlela’s second wave had three major objectives, starting with the review of the 1998 white paper on local government.

That 120-page document laid the foundation for today’s municipalities, and a review will go hand-in-hand with a review of the funding model for all local government municipalities.  

Mashatile only expects these reviews to be published in March 2026, but initial phases have already made headway.

“National Treasury has completed a review of local government conditional grants, and this process will be implemented in various stages,” said Mashatile.

The third part of the reforms will target the financial, technical and corporate services of the eight metros and will come into effect on 1 July.

Democratic Alliance member Anna Maria Van Zyl asked what would happen to delinquent government employees who had caused the rot in municipalities.

“It is not the politicians that are creating problems, it is actually the officials of the municipality, so there will definitely be consequences where we can see people are obviously transgressing,” Mashatile responded.

“The important thing is for us to give support to the municipalities to be able to serve our communities,” he added.

The ‘right technical skills’

Ramaphosa had elaborated on the plan the previous day, acknowledging that many of the country’s municipalities were failing to provide basic services.

“We will work to ensure that capable, qualified people are appointed to senior positions in municipalities, such as municipal managers and CFOs,” said Ramaphosa.

“Utilities should have the right technical skills, strong regulation and oversight, and full control of their billing and revenue functions to allow them to invest in infrastructure and maintenance,” the president explained.

This will be achieved by expanding the mandate of the Public Service Commission and coordinated efforts between National Treasury and the Department of Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs.

Spatial inequality

The reshaping of urban areas is among the objectives of Operation Vulindlela, achieved by bridging the geographical divide between poor communities and opportunities.

“The structure of our cities has to change to enable people to access work,” said Ramaphosa.

“That means changing our housing policy so that people can choose where they want to live through demand-side subsidies for homeownership and affordable rentals,” he explained.

Interventions here include; the release of publicly-owned land and buildings for affordable housing, clear the backlog of title deeds for affordable housing and incentivised inner city investment.

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