THE process of the merger between Hibiscus Coast and Ezinqoleni municipalities is set to include a public participation exercise, where the community will be given the opportunity of suggesting a name for the new municipality.
The Political Change Management Committee will sit and decide on a consultation process which is anticipated to unfold and be completed by the end of January next year.
The logistics of the consultation process will be coordinated through a sub-committee to be elected.
“In order to ensure maximum public participation the community will be offered an opportunity to email to info@hcm.gov.za, or write on the municipality’s Facebook account, and the izimbizos will also afford the community an opportunity to contribute to the process,” said deputy mayor Johnny de Wet at press briefing held on Tuesday.
This consultation follows the announcement of the amalgamation of Hibiscus Coast and Ezinqoleni municipalities, which was announced last year by the MEC for Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs, Nomusa Dube Ncube.
In light of this, the demarcation board decided to disestablish the two municipalities and form a new municipality.
Since then, a political change management committee and a technical change management committee, comprising of councillors and officials from both municipalities, has been established to manage the amalgamation process.
These committees started the process which promotes transitional measures to facilitate the restructuring of the municipalities as affected by the determination of boundaries.
The Hibiscus Coast Municipality and Ezinqoleni Municipality are part of the 15 KwaZulu-Natal municipalities which will be merged with others in 2016, to reduce the number of local government authorities in the province from 61 to 54.
