Municipalities 'a disgrace'
2009-05-29 12:18
The noble intent to ensure expeditious service delivery resulted in the establishment of a plethora of local municipalities. It was thought that manning these institutions with leaders in touch with people's day to day struggles would culminate in swifter improvement of their livelihood.
However, I am tempted to think that when our top leaders look at these institutions, they wish most of them had never seen the light of the day. Financial resources entrusted to them never reach their destination.
Auditor-general annually grieves about financial mismanagement and irregularities. We hear of tenders awarded to individuals without an iota of expertise in the services required.
The results are dilapidated houses, tar that gets wiped off by the rain and a host of incomplete projects for which full compensation was made. This typifies services South Africans get from the majority of these organs.
Proper diagnosis of all these unfortunate realities should reveal one fatal cancerous tumour. And that tumour is that jobs at the municipalities are a quid pro quo for political enthusiasts.
The consequence is a local government with a staff compliment whose CVs glitter with political credentials without any trace of technical nous to fulfil the primary mandate of the local government.
This is where you find bizarre things such as CFOs with just a matric having to be accountable for huge sums of money and compile financials in line with GRAP, PFMA and MFMA. Can we really ever expect proper financial accountability and clean audit reports?
Putting political patronage above competence in staffing these municipalities is disastrous. I would like to think that what our country has achieved since the advent of democracy is a small fry compared to what could have been accomplished if due care was exercised when employing people.
A benefit for all
Perhaps it is high time that our leaders reflect and take lessons from institutions such as South African Revenue Service (Sars). The essential ingredient making it a world class revenue organ is that competence takes precedence.
It benefits the whole country to put technical know-how above political patronage. We enjoyed a long period of robust revenue growth whose benefit we cannot see because we used an excellent human capital approach on the revenue side but an opposite one in the expenditure arena.
The culprits of this sorry state of events always get exculpated on the ground that technocrats are no where to be found. Which technocrats in their right mind will go and work at the institutions paralysed by politics and self-serving fights regarding who should be getting tenders without any regard to capacities of the bidders?
Our municipalities have become a no go zone for anyone who pledges allegiance to the letter of the law. Our municipalities are in such a great mess that it will only take strong, courageous and decisive leadership to nip this sad state of affairs in the bud.
In their current form, they are not consonant with the purpose they are supposed to fulfil. Serious restructuring is exigently required.
The highest reward our political leaders can confer to people that worked hard to make them win the elections is local government run by capable people who will make the promise of better life an indisputable reality.
Paying them with jobs for which they are not equipped is the genesis of the increasing levels of protests by people whose impatience is hitting the plateau.
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