KwaDukuza Municipality commits to service delivery

ACTING KwaDukuza Mayor, Dolly Govender, has committed her municipality to accelerating service delivery initiatives through job creation and economic transformation.

This was announced at last week’s presentation of the 2020/21 KwaDukuza Municipal Budget and IDP financial year.

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Impact of Covid-19
Govender said the municipality welcomed government’s response to the unprecedented Covid-19 pandemic, but acknowledged the associated impact on livelihoods:

‘This is a difficult time globally, with all economies constrained by decisions that have to be made to flatten the curve,’ she said. ‘This has tested every capability of the state and has had some adverse impacts on people financially.’

She said the lockdown had been a real test for government, in terms of business continuity modelling; but had provided a first-hand survey into where the community has bottlenecks in terms of products and services.

‘We are facing the reality of a pandemic for many years, as well as its setbacks, but it is evident we also need to work hand-in-hand to promote the fourth industrial revolution,’ she said.

The pandemic had resulted in a different dynamic to public participation, with virtual reality and online activity being heavily relied upon: It is unfortunate that, due to the lockdown and the resultant prohibition of public gatherings, we, like all other municipalities, were prevented from holding the usual many public participation meetings that we have been so accustomed to in the past,’ she said. ‘Nonetheless, we have had an intensive public participation process to identify the needs and reconfirm priorities of our communities.’

Corruption, housing and education
Commenting on the issue of corruption, Govender said the municipality was implementing relevant oversight structures to provide leadership in dealing with irregular expenditure:

‘We are still working towards achieving a clean audit before the end of our current term of office. To do this, we need to continue implementing our credit control policy to collect debts and develop new revenue streams.

‘This will ensure that the municipality remains financially sustainable.’

On education, Govender said they would continue the provision of registration fees as financial assistance for tertiary education.

This complements national government’s free education scheme. And, in terms of housing, she said projects have been initiated, and people’s dignity restored, through the issuing of title deeds:

‘These were given to people whose ancestors had been displaced for decades.’

Budget allocations 
According to Govender, the total revenue budget amounts to R1,891,042,680. This will go towards, among other things, infrastructure and skills’ development, social initiatives, basic services and service delivery.

‘We will continue to forge and support partnerships with various parties to fight crime, drug abuse and accelerate skills development,’ she continued.

‘We will deal with electricity theft including the allegations that some of our staff members are involved in assisting people with illegal connections. We have spent hundreds of millions of rands in the last five years on various core service delivery programmes, projects and basic services.

However, we must admit that our backlogs are many, and our funding constrained.

We have tried to maximise service delivery within the confines of our financial and administrative capacity.’

Govender said that, once the National Treasury had announced KwaDukuza Municipality’s allocation of the R20-billion municipal funding, key service delivery areas would be prioritised.

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