Former councillor Feisal Dawood of Ballito writes:
The KDM has a number of constitutional and legislative duties relating to how it manages the financial and operational affairs of the municipality.
It has to manage these duties in a manner that serves and uplifts the people of KwaDukuza.
These duties must be performed in a manner that is accountable, transparent, competent and diligent.
In exchange for performing these duties, mayors, councillors and municipal officials are remunerated – this remuneration is ultimately paid for by the residents and ratepayers of KwaDukuza as part of the rates, taxes, fines, licences and service fees they pay.
In many instances, executive directors and managers of the KDM are also paid “performance bonuses” over and above their annual salaries.
The KDM has consistently failed in performing its legislated duties to deliver quality, affordable services to residents and has been severely mismanaged for, at least, the last three years.
In doing so, the KDM has failed all the people of KwaDukuza.
Sadly the people worst affected by this inability to govern and serve are not necessarily the ratepayers in affluent areas of KwaDukuza, but rather the poor, unemployed and marginalised living in the area’s informal settlements.
The proposed increases in rates and service charges of rates 6%, sewer and refuse up 4%, electricity up 6.9% and water up 9% are significantly higher than the current CPI rate and completely out of touch with the economic realities faced by the average KwaDukuza ratepayer, already suffering the deep economic consequences brought about by the Covid-19 pandemic and the national government’s ongoing lockdown.
Some ratepayers are battling to put food on the table due to having had little to no income since mid-March 2020.
The residents and ratepayers of KwaDukuza are expected to continue to foot the bill for a mismanaged municipality, but get little to no service delivery in return for the ever-increasing rates and fees.
The annual financial statements over the past two years provide an excellent reflection of how the municipality is being mismanaged and bleeding money on wasteful expenditure, with both these receiving adverse audit opinions from the Auditor General.
The KDM should understand that the people have had enough of this, will no longer stand for it and vehemently object to its budget on the grounds that the proposed increases are unwarranted, undeserved and unaffordable, and the KDM is unable to manage the municipality’s affairs in a responsible and capable manner.
Letter shortened.
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