Community Development Workers (CDWs) from across the province will on Thursday, 11 March 2011 at the Rustenburg Kloof partake in a workshop intended to develop a set of service guidelines on how they should engage citizens in order to facilitate government service offerings.
The workshop to be facilitated by the Department of Public Service and Administration will clarify the roles and functions of CDWs in relation to citizen engagement and support community work by these government foot soldiers.
North West MEC for Local Government and Traditional Affairs, Paul Sebegoe, said, “Drawing up these guidelines would aid in addressing frustrations communities are faced with. Citizen engagement is government policy and an important part of the work undertaken by CDWs as they are required to maintain direct contact with people.”
The CDW programme is an integral part of government’s AccessStrategy of 2007 designed to accelerate service delivery by taking services to communities.
The Department of Local Government and Traditional Affairs has employed 254 Community Development Workers across all four (4) regions of the North West province with a further 64 posts in the process of being filled by end of April this year.
Since inception, the CDW programme has improved the dissemination of services information to the poor, and bridged a gap between communities and municipalities. They were also instrumental in enhancing public participation in the formulation of Integrated Development Plans (IDPs).
Enquiries:
Josias Maraba
Cell: 083 675 9629
