Sydney Mufumadi at the Excellence Awards gala dinner hosted by the Institute
for Local Government Management of South Africa, Port Elizabeth
26 September 2007
Honourable Premier Nosimo Balindlela
President of the Institute for Local Government Management of South Africa,
George Seitisho
Members of the National Executive Committee of the Institute for Local
Government Management (ILGM)
Honourable MECs
Your Lordship, the mayors here present
Councillors and senior managers from all the three spheres of our
government
Distinguished guests
Ladies and gentlemen
Introduction
This gala dinner, which is integral to your 11th Annual National Conference,
gives us the much welcomed opportunity to interact with professionals (and)
practitioners whose daily work affect many people's everyday lives in tangible
ways. Indeed, the livelihoods of all our citizens depend on how you do what you
do.
By hosting this dinner, you have made it possible for us to wine and dine
with people of distinction: men and women who are oriented on the ethos that
places high value on excellence. To the masses of our people, the outcome of
your conference has the same material value as another gathering, which is
taking place thousands of kilometres away from this venue. As you know, Heads
of State and Government including our own President, Thabo Mbeki, are meeting
in New York. They are meeting to ruminate on the pre-eminent topic of global
concern; discussing how to extricate humanity from the morass of
underdevelopment and poverty. This is a matter, which has been exercising the
collective mind of our state institutions, at least since 1994.
As they take stock of global progress, I am certain that the world leaders
will again remind us that on current trends, ours is the only continent that is
not likely to meet the United Nations (UN) Millennium Development Goals. Such a
finding has implications for us; it must have a shaping influence on the
decision, which your conference will adopt when it brings its business to a
close in two days time.
As an organisation of local government practitioners who are operating
within the South African national context, each one of the 283 local spaces is
the epicentre of your business. This is where the social achievements of our
democracy must be manifested.
President, I am happy that you chose the Nelson Mandela Metropolitan Council
as the venue for your conference. There are things happening in this
municipality which are emblematic of our determination to construct a better
future for our people.
Following the launch of Project Consolidate in 2004, we decided to lay the
ground work for improving the financial viability of our municipalities by
developing service delivery facilitators (SDF) into 12 municipalities which are
meant to serve as pilot sites. In the case of this particular municipality, an
SDF was deployed on 15 May 2005. This is part of our general offensive towards
immediate delivery and development bottlenecks.
In fairly short order, this municipality has come to constitute a leading
edge in our national drive to improve the revenue-raising capacity of our
municipalities. As a matter of fact, from 88 percent in the pre-Project
Consolidate period, this Municipality's revenue collection rate now stands at
99 percent. The Mayor informs me that the process of reviewing the Revenue
Collection Master Plan is at an advanced stage. In addition, the municipality
is working toward a new billing system which will be concluded in March
2008.
This is in line with the framework for the implementation of the new
Municipal Property Rates Act which will be in place on 1 July next year. This
trend is fairly representative of the situation in most of the municipalities
where we have been able to deploy Skills Development Facilitators (SDFs).
Indeed, the post-Project Consolidate period has seen an increase in the number
of people who have access to basic services.
But this means that some of our municipalities are actually performing
beyond their underlying institutional capacities. For in reality, they remain
afflicted by the problem of low stocks of human capital. Nevertheless, we have
a responsibility to hold them up as innovation frontiers in which we are
setting up benchmarks of good performance for emulation by others. At the same
time, we must understand the ephemeral character of interventions like Project
Consolidate and plan accordingly. Not only do we have the responsibility to
sustain the momentum which was unleashed by the Project Consolidate, but also,
we must work together to reinforce the available skills set and to encourage
ongoing accumulation of managerial know-how.
In this regard, I wish to acknowledge with appreciation, the fact that the
ILGM was amongst the first organisations to encourage their members to avail
themselves as SDFs for deployment into designated municipalities. Your members
became torchbearers of the national effort to make our country a better place
to live in. We know that we can continue to count on your partnership. It is
for this reason that we eagerly await the outcome of your conference.
I thank you.
Issued by: Department of Provincial and Local Government
26 September 2007
Source: Department of Provincial and Local Government (http://www.dplg.gov.za)
