There are cities in South Africa where the traffic lights work, electricity flows steadily, jobs are created and finances are in order. Business is attracted to them and contributes to tax revenues, which are used to improve delivery and create long-term economic growth.
These cities are Durban, whose eThekwini municipal government won a national municipal performance award this week, and Port Elizabeth, whose Nelson Mandela metro government (including Despatch and Uitenhage) came second.
The Department of Provincial and Local Government devised its Vuna awards last year — when Buffalo City (East London) won — in order to “reward municipalities which have gone an extra mile in delivering services … and play an active role in local economic development”.
The awards promote “creativity and innovation in municipal service delivery”. Co-sponsors are the South African Local Government Association, National Productivity Institute and the Development Bank of Southern Africa. Winning municipalities receive R2-million to enhance service delivery.
Among district municipalities, Nkangala in Mpumalanga (including Middleburg, Delmas and Belfast) took first prize, while in the local municipality category, the winner was Mantsopa (Ladybrand) in the Free State.
“We have moved beyond planning; we’re now looking at performance,” said departmental director general Lindiwe Msengana-Ndlela.
“We’re very determined about this … Where there are challenges there’s not going to be an excuse for non-delivery. We are going to build in South Africa a reservoir of institutional development at local level which we can share with our sister countries on the continent.”