Gauteng residents have rated local government an overall 5,1 out of 10 for service delivery and governance, according to a survey released on Monday by the department of local government.
Participants in the survey were income-earning residents from 433 of the 439 municipal wards.
They were asked to rank their overall satisfaction with the level of service delivery by their local municipality, on a scale of one to 10.
”We are worried about the 5,1 rating and believe there’s room for improvement,” said provincial minister for local government Qedani Mahlangu. ”But government has not spoken about what an acceptable norm is.”
She said, however, that the government is not happy with the rating and believes there is a lot of work to be done.
The report follows recent protests against the perceived slow delivery of services in Merafong and Westonaria.
Mahlangu insisted on Monday that the report was not prepared as a result of the protests but that it had been planned from August last year.
”The survey was done from January to June this year. It is just a coincidence that it is being released now.”
She said the aim of the report was to assess the performance of each municipality so that the department could know which municipality needed to be strengthened.
The most-improved municipalities were cited as Johannesburg, Ekurhuleni and Lesedi, with the poorest being Midvall and Nokeng Tsa Taemane. Only 16% of the residents in Midvall and Nokeng felt there had been some improvement.
The provision of water, sanitation and electricity received an overall rating of 7,1 out of 10 across the province, with just Emfuleni, Kungwini and Westonaria expressing low levels of satisfaction.
The report said this was due to the state of electrification and water connections in those areas.
In response to the high perception of corruption in local government, expressed as a major concern by six out of 10 people, Mahlangu said the department will establish anti-corruption mechanisms in all municipalities.
”All municipalities are supposed to have anti-corruption mechanisms in place. Where there aren’t, we will have to install them, strengthening the existing ones,” Mahlangu said.
Job creation and housing topped residents’ lists of priorities.
More than 50% of those surveyed believed that the national and provincial governments were performing better than local government. — Sapa