North West Province Local Government and Traditional Affairs MEC China Dodovu has lauded the launch of Business-Adopts-A-Municipality (BAAM) initiative and the subsequent signing of a memorandum of agreement with leading short-term insurer, Santam.
BAAM was recently launched in Cape Town by the Department of Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs (COGTA) in partnership with the South African Local Government Association (SALGA).
The initiative is part of COGTA`s plan to foster a closer working relationship between state owned entities (SOEs) and the private sector to support vulnerable municipalities.
MEC Dodovu says the idea is to harness collective resources towards enhancing the Local Government Agenda by working with all relevant stakeholders in advancing the interest of Municipalities.
“This is a way to complement our municipal turn around strategies in a quest to ease pressure areas and improve service delivery in municipalities. Currently Mafikeng Local Municipality is the only municipality that has been adopted for this program, and we will be working hard to bring other fledgling municipalities on board,” he said.
This initiative will assist in strengthening the development capacity of local municipalities in improving service delivery. The program will be financially supported by SANTAM, with the area of focus being fire-fighting and storm water drainage capacity within municipalities.
“We will primarily focus on improving capacity in critical areas such as project management, spatial planning, budgeting, financial management and accountability as well as local economic development,” says Dodovu.
The selected municipalities were perceived as emerging or secondary centres of socio-economic development in the national context, attracting a significant in-migration from other small towns and rural areas. A thorough consultation process with the identified municipalities confirmed the need for the support.
The project will be implemented over a period of three years.
Enquiries:
Dineo Lolokwane
Cell: 072 542 8444
South African Local Government Association to sign a Business-Adopts-A-Municipality Memorandum of Understanding with Santam
Province
