Deputy Minister in The Presidency commits to helping restore Mangaung Metropolitan Municipality to glory
Deputy Minister in the Presidency responsible for Planning, Monitoring and Evaluation (DPME), Ms. Pinky Kekana, today, 31 October 2023, conducted an oversight monitoring visit of economic and service delivery-related projects in the Mangaung Metropolitan Municipality, Free State Province.
The Deputy Minister also met and engaged with key stakeholders in the Metro, such as Free State Human Settlements, Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs MEC Ketso Makume; Mangaung Executive Mayor, Cllr Gregory Nthathisi; Mangaung Deputy Mayor Cllr Lulama Titi-Odlili; as well as senior government and municipal officials.
The visit follows previous monitoring conducted by the DPME’s Local Government Unit to assess service delivery projects in the Metro after the municipality was, regretfully, placed under intervention by the national government.
Speaking during the visit, Deputy Minister Kekana noted some of the positive joint efforts to stabilise and return the metro to its glory days, including the finalisation of the appointment of the Municipal Manager albeit challenges remain in certain areas. She committed that the DPME was dedicated to continuing to help the Metro overcome its challenges in the interest of service delivery to residents and the positive economic spinoffs for South Africa.
“If we can all work together through an integrated approach and create an enabling environment, it will help the municipality and lead to enhanced service delivery, investments, and economic growth. Our first and immediate goal is to contribute towards assisting the Mangaung Metropolitan Municipality absolve itself from S139 constitutional intervention,” said Deputy Minister Kekana.
Already, specialists from the DPME have supported the Metro with comprehensive frontline monitoring reports and proposed interventions aimed at, amongst others, strengthening the capacity and overall operations of the municipality.
To improve coordination and collaboration amongst those mandated to intervene in struggling municipalities, the DPME will lead the coherency in supporting, monitoring, and implementing the support initiatives for municipalities, thus becoming the monitor of the monitors in intervention programmes in municipalities. The latter approach, which the DPME will pilot in Mangaung, intends to ensure that the support bestowed by chief interveners in all municipalities - prioritising the dysfunctional and municipalities under administration in terms of Section 139 – is better coordinated.
Deputy Minister Kekana also led frontline monitoring of Integrated Public Transport Network projects, while all the key stakeholders committed to meet regularly and sustain working together to remove the bottlenecks and restore the Metro.
NB: High res photos from the visit are available here: https://wetransfer.com/downloads/aee780a3dce06087920fa1c160cbe7a120231031151201/96d474
Media enquiries:
Ms Zandile Ngubeni on 066 304 6609 or Zandile@dpme.gov.za
Or
Mr Lawrence Ngoveni on 082 824 3060 or Lawrence.Ngoveni@dpme.gov.za
