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Despite a baptism of fire for the newly appointed City of Tshwane administrators, who were assigned amid the Covid-19 coronavirus crisis, the 10-member team has hit the ground running, identifying and setting in place measures to address challenges facing South Africa’s capital city.
According to head administrator and former West Rand mayor Mpho Nawa, “for the team to acquaint itself with the dire state of affairs that have been crippling the metro and work towards putting in place a plan of action”, the administrators last week set about meeting internal stakeholders.
“We met senior city managers and unions such as the SA Municipal Workers’ Union and the Independent Municipal and Allied Trade Union, and immediately collected various reports to enable us to execute our 90-day mandate.
“We also met with Auditor-General Kimi Makwetu to discuss his audit report on the City of Tshwane for the 2018/19 financial year to give us an understanding of the solvency of the metro,” said Nawa.
He said the Auditor-General’s report gave a similar picture as that painted by other reports that had been received by the administrators since taking the city’s reins.
“While the metro has received an unqualified audit, irregular expenditure has skyrocketed to approximately R1 billion. Fruitless and wasteful expenditure also increased by approximately 30%, from R64 million to R89 million.”
Nawa added that, as part of the team’s measures to urgently address these and other matters faced by the city, the administrators spent the week delegating duties to themselves and other senior city managers.
“We addressed organisational issues and laid out what needs to happen and what is expected going forward, such as prioritising the building of a fit-for-purpose team and a culture of professionalism that is characterised by performance, consequence management and governance,” he said.
Other crucial issues that Nawa identified as needing urgent attention from his team included “upgrading the Rooiwal Waste Water Treatment Plant to ensure that the people of Hammanskraal finally receive clean drinking water, which is their basic human right”.
He commended his entire team, which includes Gilberto Martins, Lefadi Makibinyane, Riada Kruger, Lebogang Mahaye, Lesedi Mere, Thulisile Njapa-Mashanda, Masabatha Mutlaneng and Shiva Makoto.
He gave particular praise to acting city manager Mavela Dlamini, saying the former City of Johannesburg city manager was doing an exceptional job in utilising his expertise to resuscitate Tshwane.
On Thursday, while holding his first media briefing following the team’s appointment by Gauteng Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs MEC Lebogang Maile on Tuesday, Dlamini outlined the measures that had been instituted by the administrators leading up to the nationwide lockdown.
He said the provision of basic services to residents was non-negotiable and was at the top of their to-do list as a caring and responsive government.
He said one of the concessions made by the administrators regarding the 21-day lockdown was that residents who failed to pay for services such as electricity and water would not have their services cut off, as had previously been the case.
Dlamini also said essential services would remain mostly uninterrupted.
Nawa, concurred, saying that contingency plans were in place to deal with Covid-19.
“In the short time we have been in office, we have established a disaster management task team to monitor and deal with the challenges posed by the pandemic,” he said.
He, however, acknowledged that there was a mammoth task faced by his team regarding addressing, among other things, the service delivery backlogs faced by the city.
“Although there are numerous challenges, our mandate remains clear – we have been tasked with restoring governance. It won’t be easy, but Tshwane is a capital city and deserves to be returned to its former glory,” said Nawa.
The appointment of the team came after the national council of provinces last week endorsed Gauteng Premier David Makhura’s decision to place Tshwane under administration as per section 139(1)(c) of the Constitution.
The decision was endorsed after the Tshwane council failed to elect a new mayor or to approve an adjustment budget last month following the resignation of former mayor Stevens Mokgalapa.
The DA is fighting the placement of the metro under administration in the Pretoria High Court. The matter was heard last week and a ruling is pending.
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