Chairperson of the National Council of Provinces (NCOP)
Deputy Chairperson
Honourable Members of the NCOP
I thank you most sincerely for affording me the opportunity to address the National Council of Provinces as we continue to seek better ways to bring about meaningful change in the lives of all South Africans.
This year we are meeting under the theme: 'working together to respond to the developmental challenges facing our communities'.
This is without doubt an apt theme given that the ultimate responsibility of members of Parliament, as public representatives of the people, is to oversee the acceleration of efficient service delivery and improvement of the quality of life of all our people.
Chairperson,
The issues of service delivery backlogs; the interface between politicians and administrators; good governance; weaknesses in communication and accountability systems; and skills shortages and weaknesses in civil society structures are indeed matters of concern.
The misalignment in respect of planning, implementation, and coordination as well as capacity challenges in some sector departments, corresponds with my experiences when visiting municipalities as part of our War on poverty programme.
Calling the Executive to account for your findings as you did on 1 March 2011 demonstrates the seriousness with which you exercise your oversight role.
I also note the report from the Ad Hoc Committee on Coordinated Oversight on Service Delivery initiated by the National Assembly in September 2009 to investigate the reasons for service delivery protests.
The report comes with an implementation programme covering the following themes: governance, corruption, service delivery, finance, skills development and capacity building, communication and parliamentary oversight.
Once again this demonstrates the increasingly activist role that Parliament is playing. Parliament is no longer just sitting waiting to receive reports from the Executive.
The impediments to delivery are being directly investigated, solutions are being proposed and the implementation of these proposals will be monitored, with Parliament taking the lead.
Chairperson,
As you would know service delivery, and more pivotally, the improvement of our people’s lives, are expressed through the Integrated Development Plans (IDP).
It is imperative that all critical projects for local economic development are located within Integrated Development Plans given the IDP’s strategic purpose as government’s development programme.
IDPs are meant to be sources of the communities' visions for social and economic development, setting out how land should be used, what infrastructure and services are needed and how the environment should be protected.
They have to be aligned to national and provincial policies and programmes.
Our findings however have been that there is a lack of meaningful participation by communities and local stakeholders in the IDP process.
Key reasons for this are insufficient economic, institutional and human capacity; inadequate knowledge of government and budgetary processes; and that other spheres of government have not deepened the reach of their programmes sufficiently, nor supported municipalities and local communities effectively.
In addition, high turnover of key municipal personnel also constrains delivery.
In areas where participation occurs, it often is merely for compliance, with most indicators already being determined by officials.
And while it is understood that IDPs have to be aligned, there often is little mention of provincial and national programmes.
If resources are to be optimally utilised; if delivery is to be accelerated; if we are ever to overcome the spatial inequities inherited from Apartheid, then we have to get IDPs right.
Members of Parliament too are important stakeholders and have a role to play in ensuring maximum community participation in IDP processes.
The primary platform for ensuring streamlined, qualitative stakeholder input into the IDP process is the Ward Committee.
In many instances however, local municipalities have failed to set up ward committees.
Where they exist, some remain excluded from decision-making processes.
The effectiveness of ward committees are also impeded by limitations in terms of levels of education, skills and expertise; and a lack of access to resources, including computers and internet connections.
Municipalities therefore need to invest more towards developing capacity for ward committee members, including ward councillors, particularly on their intended roles and responsibilities and provide them with the necessary enabling resources.
It is clear that there is a need for collective ownership of the development process and strengthened relations between ward committees and independent civil society formations in the promotion of meaningful engagements between local government and community members.
Much attention needs to be given to establishing strengthened communication strategies that will enhance effective communication between municipalities and communities.
Parliamentarians, who have greater access to resources and information, have to provide support at a municipal level to ensure that ward committees are functional.
We should do this bearing in mind that overcoming poverty is, or should be, in essence, an ongoing battle sustained by working together by all stakeholders, all focused on achieving the objective of government programmes such as the IDPs.
Chairperson,
The current status of poverty in South Africa has been officially published in the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) Country Report 2010 which was presented to the United Nations, last year.
According to this report, the proportion of people living in and experiencing absolute poverty has declined in South Africa.
It is known that poverty programmes in this country can be undermined by a huge drain of resources at household and national levels.
Be that as it may, the above report is encouraging in that it shows that we have the ability as government and indeed as the nation, to eradicate the scourge of poverty from among our midst.
It should also be noted that the unequal allocation and acquisition of resources across the population remains a major challenge towards dealing with ensuring improved livelihoods of the people of South Africa.
One of the programmes I would like to mention is the Community Work Programme, which aims to provide an employment safety net, by providing a minimum level of regular work opportunities to participants, with a predictable number of days of work provided per month.
This supplements the existing livelihood strategies of participants and provides a basic level of income security through work. It has the following characteristics:
- It is targeted at unemployed and/or underemployed people of working age, including those whose livelihood activities are insufficient to lift them out of poverty. It is an area-based programme that is implemented in a defined local area (called a site). A site operating at full capacity offers work opportunities to 1,000 people.
- The programme offers 2 days of work per week (or the monthly equivalent thereof); providing 100 days of work per person spread through the year.
- It currently employs approximately 83 000 people across 46 municipalities country-wide with a budget allocation of about R700 million. The programme will be up-scaled and could provide as many as 237 000 work opportunities by 2014 as part of the local government sector’s contribution to realising the Millennium Development Goals of halving unemployment.
A further initiative builds on commitment to introduce more collective forms of enterprises.
The project to create ward based cooperatives aims at setting up economically active community groups producing goods and services in every ward.
A proposed strategy has been developed to roll out this project. Whilst acknowledging that this project will cover the entire country, it is largely aimed at the poor rural communities.
With these communities economically active and earning a living, this will also assist in the revenue generation by municipalities.
In this regard, other projects and initiatives include:
- A programme to reduce municipal debt and enhance revenue collection;
- We have launched “Operation Clean Audit 2014” aimed at ensuring that municipalities (and provinces) get unqualified audit reports by 2014;
- Regulations have been put in place to ensure that municipalities pay suppliers, especially small businesses within 30 days of receiving a valid invoice;
- Some municipalities have established local economic development agencies to stimulate economic development; and
- Some municipalities are preparing applications for the establishment of Industrial Development Zones within their areas.
I have outlined some key government driven initiatives that respond to the developmental challenges facing our communities.
The fundamental philosophy behind our approach however is one of empowerment.
Our social capital is what will catapult South Africa into realising its full potential.
All government initiatives will thus be driven by partnerships with communities, the private sector and the rest of civil society.
As government we have also placed much value in the approach of decentralisation.
Key to this decentralised approach to development are the following principles:
- Local economic development should not be regarded as economic development of a lower order;
- The core of economic development is the development of business opportunities and enterprise development;
- Spatial development at local level can play a significant role in economic development;
- Local Economic Developmentprovide foundations for development in communities;
- The identification of the economic potential of an area and the development of business opportunities should be done jointly by government and the private sector with support and incentives from municipalities and the rest of government;
- Local economic development should be based on the competitive and comparative advantages of an area;
- Small business development and the development of co-operatives at local level will make a significant contribution to GDP growth.
- A focused collaboration between municipalities and the local captains of commerce, industry, agriculture and mining is required to unlock the significant potential of municipal areas in South Africa.
Chairperson,
We continue to make steady progress with regards to improved planning, coordination and delivery. Statistics show that there has been improvement in:
- Access to water from 75 percent in 2001 to 93 percent to date
- Access to electricity from 32 percent in 1994 to 82 percent to date;
- Access to basic sanitationfrom 60 percent in 2001 to 70 percent to date and
- Access to basic refuse removal from 59 percent in 2001 to 69 percent to date.
But statistics do not reflect quality, they do not reveal challenges, and therefore visits to municipalities remain important.
During the next three years the roll out of social and economic infrastructure will remain important.
More than R800 billion has been set aside for the maintenance and expansion of roads, dams, electricity plans, ports and rail systems.
Within this amount notably, the Municipal Infrastructure Grant is set to increase from R9.7 billion in 2010/11 to R15.3 billion in 2013/14.
Our priority however is jobs. And as indicated in Minister Gordhan’s Budget Vote address over R70 billion will go towards the Expanded Public Works Programme (EPWP).
R9 billion will go towards the Jobs Fund and tax incentives to the tune of R20 billion has been targeted for job creation.
A large percentage of the budget has also gone towards skills development as increasing our levels of education and skills is central to breaking the chain of poverty and dependency.
I want to conclude my input by focusing on the role of the NCOP in responding to the developmental challenges facing our communities, as the NCOP is a critical partner in facilitating synergies within the spheres of government and between government and civil society.
Section 139 of the Constitution provides for provincial intervention in municipalities that are not able to perform their executive functions, and section 100 makes similar provisions for national government intervention in provinces.
The approvals of such interventions reside within the NCOP.Fact finding missions, such as those already embarked upon by your honourable selves, must continue, and the executives within provincial and national spheres of government should be alerted of distressed municipalities that require support.
This can be enhanced by members of the NCOP actively engaging provinces and municipalities (through the provincial legislatures) on matters of planning, revenue generation and fiscal discipline; and overseeing that public participation is central to these processes.
Parliament has done well over the past two years, but you require even further capacity if you are to operate optimally.
You need resources that will enable a critical assessment of the appropriateness of legislation, policies and programmes brought before you for ratification.
There has to be good record keeping and follow-up on the implementation of recommendations.
Constituency offices can also be used more effectively to increase public participation in the policy making and legislative processes.
Constituency offices should link up with structures such as ward committees, community meetings and community development workers to provide information on the work of parliament and to receive feedback.
Creating an active citizenry is fundamental to building an activist parliament.
Members of Parliament should likewise lead by example and actively participate in constituency work and not rely only on constituency office administrators for public engagement.
Our greatest developmental challenges are poverty, unemployment and dependency.
A spirit of collective ownership of and passion to address these challenges is what is required if it is to be speedily eradicated.
I have spoken on the role of government, the role of the community, the role of business and the role of the NCOP and have outlined how we envisage the integration of all the relevant stakeholders in the strife to address the developmental challenges affecting our communities.
I have full confidence that if every stakeholder plays its role, and if we draw of the full abilities of every person in this country, the successes achieved will be far beyond what we can imagine.
I thank you.
