Cllr Peter Verbeek of Ward 10 in the Emfuleni Local Municipality writes:

The Emfuleni Local Municipality financial year of 2020/2021 will be one that both residents and businesses would not remember kindly.
During this 2020/2021 financial year, three sets of expenditures were imposed on the municipality that have ultimately caused chaos amongst both its residents and businesses alike. The ANC-led municipality received the dubious honour of being the first amongst peers receiving a court order to pay a Chinese company R492 million (8% of its budget) for the irregularity of its smart-meter contract (without any consequence management for Emfuleni staff). In addition, the same ANC-led municipality condoned an “Irregular Expenditure” of R1,1 billion (17% of its budget) without any consequence management for Emfuleni staff, and, all signs are indicating that the NERSA compliance budget of R159 million (2% of its budget), to keep its electricity license, will in all probability not be adhered too before the end of June this financial year.
In total, 27% of Emfuleni Budget has been imposed on the municipality this financial year. Together with 20% of its budget for staff this equates to 47% of its budget re-equated than originally intended. For the past many years Emfuleni is seemingly unable to gather more than an average of 71% of its revenue per annum. In other words, in essence the 2020/2021 budget entails that 24% of its revenue (71% – 47%) will be spent on 80% expenditure (100% – 20% staff costs) activities.
The ramifications are clearly visible in Ward 10:
• In CW 2, CW 5 and CW 6 it took the municipality more than 62 days of reporting before sewerage was attended to;
• In CW 5 and CW 6 alternatively no water/low water pressure is in its 7th week;
• An electricity cable in CE 3 took 29 days to procure and replace;
• 51 trees in CE 1 have been reported for more than 5 years to be either pruned or removed; and
• Waste collection of once to twice per month has ensured that all open public spaces have become illegal dumps in their own right.
While Emfuleni is trying to do the impossible (using 24% of its revenue to conduct 80% of its expenditure activities), residents and businesses are bearing the brunt.

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