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Former glory shattered: Residents attend a community meeting in Steve Tshwete Local Municipality, where the economic fallout of Mpumalanga’s contracting coal sector is increasingly visible. Once one of the country’s top-performing municipalities, it is now struggling with falling rates payments, growing arrears and rising indigent support applications as retrenchments increase. Photo: Ihsaan Haffejee
COAL MINE CLOSURES
Video

Coal’s slow death in Mpumalanga

As jobs disappear from the coal belt, Middelburg’s economy is buckling. Unpaid rates, collapsing businesses and stalled transition support are deepening the crisis

  • Marcia Moyana
  • Thabo Molelekwa
8 min read
Good examples: In Midvaal, the library was teeming with locals who had access to free wifi and computers provided by the municipality. Photo: Delwyn Verasamy
ANC

In Midvaal, the evidence suggests the DA does govern better

Even the informal settlements have running water, uninterrupted electricity and their own toilets

  • Lunga Mzangwe
8 min read
Mess: Comparisons are often drawn between Midvaal and the badly run Emfuleni municipality next door. Photos: Delwyn Verasamy
ANC

For Emfuleni residents, life is a daily grind of service delivery failures

The ANC-run municipality refuses to accept blame, accusing some residents of paying for DStv, servicing clothing accounts and drinking expensive alcohol instead of paying their…

  • Lunga Mzangwe
7 min read
DA leader in Gauteng Solly Msimanga. (Delwyn Verasamy/M&G)
ACTIONSA

Msimanga: Moya a ribbon cutter who takes glory for DA’s work

The Democratic Alliance leader in Gauteng said most of the work the ActionSA mayor for Tshwane has been taking credit for was done by her predecessor, Cilliers Brink

  • Lunga Mzangwe
6 min read
A cancer patient receives treatment.
BUSISIWE MKHWEBANE

Public protector’s probes highlight crumbling Eastern Cape hospitals

Seventeen investigative reports, undertaken by Busisiwe Mkhwebane’s office, detail gross negligence and maladministration in government structures

  • Chris Gilili
3 min read