S139 interventions in North West: COGTA MEC briefing

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Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs

25 November 2020
Chairperson: Ms F Muthambi (ANC)
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Meeting Summary

Video: Portfolio Committee on Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs,25 November 2020

The Committee was briefed on the progress made on the s139 interventions in the North West by the Executive Council.

The Council said that apartheid took the blame for the political and governance failures in the municipalities that had been placed under administration.

The Council made it clear that it did not favour s139 and would have preferred that s154 of the Constitution is invoked to deal with the challenges in the affected municipalities.

The Chairperson of the North West Provincial Standing Committee on Cooperative Governance, Human Settlements and Traditional Affairs (COGHSTA) openly differed with the Council and lamented the executive overreach in the affected municipalities.

The Chairperson said that the main challenge that faced the interventions seemed to be the lack of clarity on the roles and responsibilities of the appointed administrators due to the inconsistencies between their appointment letters, the terms of reference concluded with the Provincial Department and misalignment with the requirements of legislation.

As a result, the interventions have had little impact on the audit outcomes of the affected municipalities.

Committee Members lamented the lack of political leadership as well as political instability in the affected municipalities. They also expressed disbelief that affected residents would protest against interventions aimed at improving their lives. They likened it to a dying patient who refused lifesaving medicine.

Meeting report

Opening remarks by the Chairperson

In her opening remarks, the Chairperson congratulated Mr Mmoloki Cwaile, MEC: North West Department of Cooperative Governance, Human Settlements and Traditional Affairs (COGHSTA) on his recent appointment as MEC. She reminded the MEC that his appointment came at a time where the majority of municipalities in the North West had undergone constitutional interventions in terms of s139. She noted that the financial health of these municipalities remained a cause for distress.

She lamented the political infighting in that province expressing that it had led to serious governance challenges and a total breakdown of service delivery. She said that during a previous meeting, the Committee had deduced that there seemed to be a lack of clarity about the roles and responsibilities of the appointed administrators and that the terms of reference had been vague as well. There had also been a misalignment with relevant legislation. The intervention in terms of s139, had little impact on the audit outcomes at these municipalities. She used the example of the Madibeng Municipality that had regressed after it had been placed under administration.

The J.B. Marks Municipality remained stagnant and incurred irregular expenditure of about R680 million. It remained one of the top three worst performing municipalities in the province. The administrator in this municipality even wrote to the Auditor-General (AG) to ascertain what his role was. The terms of reference were also confusing. The matter ultimately ended up in the courts, with the municipality winning the case against the administrator.

In another municipality, the administrator was also taken to court and lost. The court case highlighted the fact that it was not possible to have two accounting officers in one municipality. The Chairperson advanced that these are by no means isolated incidences. She noted that the Provincial Department, which the MEC now led, played a significant role in resolving the problems in the municipalities that had been placed under administration.

She requested the MEC brief the Committee on how his Department intended to deal with the severe challenges in these municipalities.

Comments by MEC Cwaile

MEC Cwaile informed the Committee that when he was the Chair of Chairs in the North West provincial legislature, he held the notion that s139 had not been the right course of action for the affected municipalities. He expressed that there had been shortcomings and that administrators were not magicians that could solve a 100 years of problems. He blamed apartheid for the woes in the North West. He said that apartheid had left serious deficiencies in the province as resources were meant for a few. He noted that it was unfortunate that communities did not understand that the problems municipalities were experiencing had been inherited from apartheid. The MEC did not see s139 as being helpful.  He said that “s139 envisaged that there would be a promulgation of the section to take it to a logical conclusion.”

He added that s139 had brought dangerous criminals to oversee distressed Municipalities and that these administrators “had been grabbed from the streets’”.

Expressing his opinion, the MEC said that he favoured s154. He said that this section had not been used since the dawn of democracy and instead s139 had always been used.

He added that his focus was also to change institutional capacity so that municipalities could be enabled to exercise their powers and functions. He said “now all these other measures should not be the focus or the most important deliverables”. He pointed out how he told the provincial legislature that a new law had to be passed to look at these inefficiencies so that the provincial government could be able to say that it has been able to turn things around.

He stated that it was an error to not have exhausted s154 and those municipalities had been thrown under the bus by s139 due to political instability.  He stated that the he had warned the Department when he was the Chair of Chairs that officials should not talk about political instability when they cannot even tell whether it is an intra of one party or other parties.  The law did not dictate political instability. There were key deliverables that the Department had to attend to. He was of the opinion that the interventions had sought to review the composition of political leadership.

According to the MEC, s139 meant that “we were going to fail. The issue of municipalities is simple because even when there is a shortage of money, we do not have a record management system that is able to capture data that we use for the purpose of accounting that can help to reconcile.”

He further noted that record keeping was the first step in accounting because when one had information, it can solve problems. Some municipalities do not have that capacity.

The MEC expressed that he was confident that the province would get it right and that councils should play a role in progressive and effective management. He reiterated to Members that he wanted to explore the use of s154.

Mr Phihadu Motoko, Head of Department (HOD): North West Department of Cooperative Governance, Human Settlements and Traditional Affairs (COGHSTA) informed the Committee that additional municipalities had been placed under administration by the Provincial Government. These municipalities include Mahikeng, Tswaing, Naledi, Bojanala, Lekwa Teemane and Madibeng, to name but a few.

The North West government has identified several shortcomings that include poor financial management which undermines service delivery, along with wastage of finances and resources.

Mr Motoko said that governance and leadership had been the main challenges linked to poor municipal revenue management which is critical to improving financial sustainability. Councils have been unable to deliver on their mandate.

Concerns about a lack of project monitoring and deliberate lack of accountability by political and administrative municipal leadership were also cited.

Discussion

Mr C Brink (DA) congratulated the MEC on his appointment and stressed that he hoped that he had been properly briefed. He noted that the topic for discussion by the Committee had been the North West’s s139 interventions in its municipalities, yet the province itself had been placed under Section s100 by the National Government. He wanted to ascertain whether MECs in the province had seen their functions being impaired by the s100 intervention. He seemed to recall that during a previous meeting, the North West Premier, Mr Job Mokgoro, had complained about uncertainty relating to decisions that emanated from administrators that had been parachuted into the North West from Pretoria.

On the enforcement of the code of conduct for councillors, he noted that the onus or constitutional mandate to remove errant councillors had been assigned to the MEC in consultation with a respective municipality. In light of this, he wanted to ascertain what precluded an MEC to remove councillors that did not perform their fiduciary duties in the event that a council refused to act.

Lastly, he also wanted to know how many serious cases of misconduct by councillors were currently before the MEC for consideration.

Mr G Mpumza (ANC) wanted to know to what extent there had been resistance by municipalities to be placed under administration by the province, when the province itself had been placed under administration by national government.

He noted that it was evident that some municipalities had become serial offenders and wanted to know what lessons these municipalities had learned. He lamented the continued mismanagement at municipalities that had been placed under administration.

Lastly, he wanted to know how these municipalities could regress when they had been offered the necessary assistance. He found it shocking that some municipalities had two Mayors, two Speakers and even two Executive Committees. He failed to understand how such a situation had been allowed to continue and asked for an explanation on how these decisions would be reversed.

Mr Mpumza asked why Section 71 reports such as the Monthly Budget Monitoring reports as prescribed by the Municipal Finance Management Act (MFMA) had not been scrutinised by the North West provincial government. This, he said, would surely have raised red flags about the dire straits that municipalities found themselves in.

Mr K Ceza (EFF) recalled that he had heard about the water service delivery woes in some Municipalities in the North West and that he had also checked the youth unemployment rate in some of these municipalities. In some municipalities the youth unemployment rate sat at 41%. He expressed his dismay at the reality that South Africa’s future had been drinking contaminated water.

He asked for an explanation of what the province was doing to ensure that those responsible are being held to account. He also touched on endemic corruption and what was being done to stem this scourge.

He further added that he had heard that certain municipalities had railed against the efficacy of s139 and that this was an indictment of the process when officials themselves had lost confidence in the process.

The Member said that he would not be congratulating the new MEC as fish were designed to swim. He took issue with the MEC’s comments that instead of invoking s139, the province should look at the possibility of invoking s154. Section 154 of the Constitution states that “The national government and provincial governments, by legislative and other measures, must support and strengthen the capacity of municipalities to manage their own affairs, to exercise their powers and to perform their functions. (2) Draft National or Provincial legislation that affects the status, institutions, powers or functions of local government must be published for public comment before it is introduced in Parliament or a provincial legislature, in a manner that allows organised local government, municipalities and other interested persons an opportunity to make representations with regard to the draft legislation.”

He added that if s139 did not work, what made the MEC think that s154 would work, given the chronic service delivery challenges and incidences of graft and malfeasance.

He also added that the Mamusa Local Municipality in the Dr Ruth Segomotsi Mompati District, had been dissolved and serious internal tensions had ensued. How would service delivery bottle necks be resolved, he asked. He emphasised that service delivery had to improve. 

Mr I Groenewald (FF+) congratulated the MEC on his appointment and indicated that he thought the MEC position was a downgrade from the previous Chair of Chairs position that MEC Cwaile occupied in the North West legislature. He recalled that when MEC Cwaile served as the Chair of Chairs, he had written a letter to the Minister of COGTA, Dr Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma, regarding the provincial departments in the North West having been placed under s100.

He wanted to ascertain whether the Minister ever replied to the letter and if so, what she had said.

Ms G Opperman (DA) noted that it appeared that there had been confusion about the terms of reference of administrators and the alignment of these appointments to the relevant legislation. She said that it also appeared as if there had been the wholesale implementation of s139, without looking at the prevailing needs of each municipality. This resulted in the wrong interventions being implemented in certain provinces.

She also requested information on the litigation that the Department had lost against municipalities and decried the regression in Municipalities that had been placed under administration.

She further asked what the role of the administrators had been thus far and whether their interventions had brought about value.

In the case of Madibeng Municipality, the ANC controlled Council had bought cookware embossed with the ANC logo at tax payers’ expense. What consequences had there been for this gross abuse of state resources.

Mr B Hadebe (ANC) touched on the refusal to give concurrence on powers. He wanted to ascertain whether the situation had changed after the refusal to grant concurrence by the courts.

He added that he had begun to concede to the notion that Members seemed to find administrative solutions to political problems. He was of the opinion that it been political instability that led to situations where certain municipalities had two Mayors, two Speakers and two Executives. This situation was untenable as administrative solutions were not the answer to internal political battles in the North West.

He found the idea of “no-go areas” as interesting, especially in light of the citizens spearheading protests against government intervention. He wanted to know whether provincial authorities had engaged with protestors to ascertain the crux of their grievances. To him, it seemed as if the protestors agreed with the shambolic circumstances that they found themselves in. He likened the situation to a dying patient that refuses medicine to get better.

He further added that the other dimension to the dysfunction in these municipalities related to financial mismanagement. He asked to be apprised on the nature of the financial management interventions i.e. financial recovery plans and what these entailed. He also wanted to know whether s154 would be the magic bullet to the woes experienced in the North West. His blunt assessment was that the entire province was a problem.

Mr Hadebe commented, almost sarcastically, that the same province that had been placed under administration, imposed administration on its errant municipalities. He wondered whether this was a revolt against the provincial government. He asked whether the Committee was being used to settle political scores.

Ms D Direko (ANC) noted that several municipalities in the North West had been placed under administration and that the Committee had met with a sizable number of these municipalities. What emanated from these interactions had been that the challenges ran deep and that she agreed with Mr Hadebe that the entire province had to be placed under a state of disaster.

She expressed the hope that the new MEC would be able to turn things around and asked whether the MEC’s Department had conducted extensive research into the root causes of the problems in these municipalities. She also wanted to ascertain whether the officials and the administrators had been able to work together and whether the appointed administrators had been up to the task. She specifically wanted to know whether they had been capable and had the prerequisite skills to conduct such sensitive work.

She also alluded to the political instability that permeated through the entire province and requested a brief on how these political ructions would be dealt with. She was of the opinion that as long as political instability reared its head in the North West, chronic service delivery challenges would persist.

The Chairperson noted that the province was supposed to submit a progress report to the National Council of Provinces (NCOP) on the s139 interventions in the North West. She wanted to know whether this report had been submitted. She also asked the National COGTA Department to respond. She said that what had been happening in the North West was common.

She requested information on whether the provincial government had considered invoking s137 of the Constitution. Section 137 deals with the transfer of functions stating that “The Premier by proclamation may transfer to a member of the Executive Council—(a) the administration of any legislation entrusted to another member; or (b) any power or function entrusted by legislation to another member”.

The Chairperson added that the National COGTA Department could not be a passive participant in the woes of the North West and that it should not allow the situation in that province to deteriorate any further. She lamented the water service delivery challenges in the Tswaing Local Municipality and informed that the municipality did not receive its equitable share as it did not have the capacity to spend the funds.

She added that the North West Provincial Treasury had also been invited to the meeting and no communication had been received on whether it would attend the meeting. She assumed that its input had been merged with the presentation that had been presented by Mr Motoko.

She also attributed the main problem in the North West to financial mismanagement. The Chairperson informed the MEC that he had been the first MEC to mention s154 as an alternative to s139. She noted that the Committee had raised concerns about s154. Even the district municipalities in the North West had been placed under administration and thus faced their own woes. She failed to fathom how these district municipalities would be able to assist local municipalities when they did not have the capacity either.

Her final question touched on the money owed to ESKOM and water boards by municipalities. She seemed to recall that some municipalities still honoured apartheid era arrangements that prioritised farmers over poor black people. She asked that this matter be investigated in the City of Matlosana Local Municipality.

Response

On the water crisis in Matlosana, the MEC said that his Department would investigate the issue of selective subsidies and that he would also check the circumstances surrounding food security.

On the root causes of protests he said that there had been a multiplicity of various methodologies to understand the challenges at municipalities and that his Department had followed the guidelines of the AG report.

He highlighted that the AG report had indicated the areas that municipalities had to improve on and change. He informed the Committee that he would undertake to smaller visitations to show how easy it is to do what must be done according to the AG, including consequence management.

He said that there had to be promulgation of laws by both national and province and that even the Constitution said that there had to be a regulatory framework. The Bill is in the process of providing guidance on s139. The MEC said that it would not consider this Constitutional provision if and when other avenues have not been explored. There have been no shortcomings of s154 as no one has explored that avenue.

He informed the Committee that the province would be using managerial science to address managerial challenges.

On disclaimers issued by the AG, he said that those disclaimers meant that there has been no record keeping. He emphasised that records had to be put in place as this was the first step in accounting. The system should allow for reconciliation once before the end of the year. What has not happened is for the executive to join hands.

MEC Cwaile added that the AG report had suggested that municipalities had incompetent officials. These officials had all been appointed through nefarious means. According to the MEC, nothing stopped him from going to court to have these appointments nullified. He reminded Members that the Department of Public Service and Administration (DPSA) had started to contract judges to oversee disciplinary processes. He stated that the Department should not overtake and hijack people. What it wants is for systems to be built and put in place so that it can get results.

He added that his Department did not want to resolve political instability through the courts. Political stabilisation must not be about one political party undermining the voters’ choice. Democratic constitutionalism has to be protected. The MEC pointed out that the Integrated Development Plan (IDP) has also not happened.

He further stated that protestors wanted to achieve certain targets and he did not want to establish whether people had been influenced or not. When community protests are not real they collapse by themselves.

Only two regions had water authority and two kids had drowned in the one area. The district Municipality had not given them any money.

According to the MEC’s view, litigation was twofold and that even a cleaner would lawyer up. He stated that the Constitution envisages there is no need be taking each other to court. The Intergovernmental Framework does not provide for going to court and the Provincial Executive has to help Parliament.

Regarding the appointment of Department Heads and other senior managers, a panel had been constituted.

MEC Cwaile said that that the issues experienced are not suggesting that there was no good at all that came out of s100, however,  just like s139, it has overstayed its welcome. Their stays have been prolonged. By virtue of their reports, the key deliverables had been delivered. Any of the irregularities cannot be left unchallenged. He said that his Department will get all that from the audit reports. Even if the audit reports showed improvements because of the administration.

The MEC noted that the province did not have adequate vetting procedures and that a Special Investigating Unit (SIU) proclamation was needed. He said that the time is now to go after those who owe the Department money and that it is just a matter of time before that is done. The Department will try to continue working with institutions that support democracy.

He further added that his Department has a good relationship with his Treasury counterpart and that the latter had been the most progressive Department. He noted that Treasury officials had been running around like headless chickens and that his Department just had to consolidate resource capacities. Going forward he said that the Department would be withholding money and it is making its own law which is a matter that it has strongly raised.

He vowed that he was going to deal with the issue of contaminated water. He said he is making the decision that the anti-corruption task team and the AG must conduct a forensic investigation. This does not have to be advertised as he can just write a letter. The Hawks planned to deal with municipalities. The use of the law enforcement agency is for the purpose to serve as a deterrent.

Discipline was the responsibility of the manager and not municipal councils, even the supervisory competence. It will be used to deal with many other issues and for that the Department would need to submit a report.

Follow-up comments by the Chairperson

The Chairperson noted that the MEC did not deal with the s100 intervention and that there had been five Departments that had not been affected by the intervention. She asked the MEC to address this matter.  She also requested clarity on whether s139 had been invoked before the province had been placed under the s100 administration or after this Section had been invoked.

She also wanted to ascertain when the last report on the s100 administration had been submitted to the NCOP and decried the fact that no other progress reports had been submitted to the NCOP either. She reiterated that these are important matters. She reminded the MEC that he used to be the Chair of Chair and was thus in the perfect position to speak to this. She also recalled the point made by Mr Brink about the comments made by Premier Mokgoro that the interventions in the province had failed.

She asked Mr Motoko to give a response from the Department’s side, whilst at the same time lauding the MEC for the hard work already done by him. She hoped that provincial officials would assist the MEC to bring about his vision.

Response

Mr Motoko said that the MEC had covered a lot of ground and that he would cover a few issues, which would speak to the relationship withTreasury, section 71 and having a good working relationship. There is a memorandum of understanding in place that indicates the division of responsibilities between the two departments on the MFMA. There has been close cooperation on the debt owed by municipalities to ESKOM.

He assured Members that there had been clarity on the terms of reference that had been drafted and that these terms had been reviewed by departmental legal advisers as well as the state law adviser. These legal advisers had indicated that the terms were above board. Despite the legal opinions, chaos still ensued when the administrators arrived at these municipalities.

He added that the Department had assisted municipalities with drafting their recovery plans and that national COGTA had also provided assistance. Tswaing had been assisted through this intervention. Rustenburg was also being assisted. Assistance with economic recovery plans were ongoing.

He noted that some of the questions had been broadly addressed by the MEC and that he would not like to go back to these questions, unless directed to do so.

Mr Aaron Motswana, Chairperson: North West Provincial Standing Committee on Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs, suggested the Provincial Executive was at fault for the political turmoil in the municipalities that had been placed under administration. He said that this interference impacted on the governance in municipalities.

He added that the North West had been placed under administration in 2018 and shortly after that a new MEC was appointed. After two months in the position, the then MEC made a request to the Provincial Executive Committee to place five municipalities under administration. Just before the May 2019 general elections, another request was made to place additional municipalities under administration. A letter was then signed by the then MEC that effected this decision.

He explained that he tried to hammer the point home that the Provincial Executive Committee should not be too quick to intervene in these municipalities and that it would have been best to first wait for the outcome of the 2019 general elections. The decision to place these municipalities under administration was supposed to be taken by the incoming administration.

He said that with confidence and without fear or favour the interventions that had been determined since 2018 had been politically motivated. He conceded that the municipalities in question had problems, but these problems had not been of such a nature that warranted intervention as it was now.

He told the Chairperson that he felt it important to bring that to the Committee’s attention and pointed out that the province had misled the NCOP, the Minister of COGTA and the people of the North West by placing Mamusa under administration. According to Mr Motswana, the reasons advanced for invoking s139 in relation to Mamusa had been fabricated, especially if Mamusa’s performance in relation to the other municipalities that had been placed under administration, had been viewed.

In the case of Mamusa, the decision to invoke s139 was quickly followed by a decision to dissolve the Council. This resulted in the problems persisting in Mamusa with the municipality being in total disarray. He stressed that as much as the Executive had fiduciary powers assigned to it by the Constitution, these powers could not be used to score political mileage through punitive actions. 

He noted that he did not wish to enter into discussions about what the MEC had responded to. His firm view was that when a determination was made to invoke s139, s154 had to be taken into account as well. This section defines the powers and mandate of Municipalities as a separate sphere of cooperative governance. It also precludes other spheres of Government on impeding on the fiduciary duties of Local Governments.

In a direct swipe at the MEC, he said that Provincial Executives liked to cite s154 without referencing the equally important s15.

On the water challenges in municipalities, he advised the MEC to look into actions of the two municipalities in the North West that had water boards. These two municipalities, he said, had been allowed to run amok and absconded from their service delivery responsibilities. These municipalities received huge grants that had not been apportioned for service delivery projects, instead it was used to bloat their structures. These municipalities also bought fleets of vehicles that were sold to officials the minute it reached a certain mileage that was way below the recommended mileage for the resale of state vehicles and the province never saw this as a problem. He conceded that there was no magical formula in resolving these problems.

He lamented that district municipalities themselves were in disarray as they did not even spend their equitable share on what it had been intended for. He advised the MEC that he could always make recommendations to devolve the functions of district municipalities if these districts failed to prescribe to the division of revenue.

He also added that he wanted to correct the statement by Mr Motoko about the two Mayors, two Speakers etc. He used Tswaing as an example. He noted that the MEC’s Department had legal representatives that could intervene before a situation got out of hand. He sketched a scenario where a council meeting had been called and during this meeting deliberations collapsed. The Speaker then adjourned the sitting, only for a handful of councillors to call their own meeting and elect new leadership, regardless of the fact that there had been no quorum. Instead, of the Provincial Department condemning this rogue action, it remained mum. The matter eventually ended up in the courts, with the courts invalidating the election of a new leadership, yet the Provincial Department that the MEC led still recognised the legitimacy of the rogue decision. Mr Motswana noted that this was wrong.

He claimed that the Provincial Department had a vested interest in who should govern in Tswaing. He documented another instance where the Department had failed in its fiduciary duties.

He emphasised that the Municipal Systems Act and the Structures Act dictated the processes that had to be followed when new leadership was elected. The Provincial Department had to accept the outcome of these legitimate processes, instead of fuelling the flames.

He stressed that the province had to separate the political problems from the governance challenges and in his view s100 should have been revoked as of yesterday. He lamented that Provincial Departments in the North West had lost a lot of money. He stated that he disagreed with administrators that had argued that they did not have to account to him. They claimed that they only account to the National Minister of COGTA.

He informed the Committee that he was a co-author of the letter that had been sent to Minister Dlamini-Zuma that detailed 43 questions posed to her about the s139 intervention. He said that the provincial legislature had to be informed of where funds appropriated by it had been spent. He claimed that 70% of funds appropriated by the North West legislature had been spent outside of the province by the administrators. This had been a big concern for the province as there was a high unemployment problem and businessmen might protest about the lack of opportunities for them.

Comments by the Chairperson

The Chairperson wanted the Director General (DG) of the National Department of COGTA to reply to the questions that has been posed to her. Upon discovering that the DG had left the meeting without notifying the Chairperson or delegating to other officials. She ruled the DG out of order. She reminded officials that they were accountable to Parliament.

Follow-up replies by the national Department COGTA

Ms Mohanuoa Mabidilala, Chief Director: Monitoring and Evaluation, national Department of COGTA, responded on behalf of the DG. She informed the Committee that the North West had been placed under s100(a) administration and that nine directives have been issued to that province. She added that none of the powers of the Executive had been taken away.

She further stated that in February 2020 a joint exercise had been conducted with the province to review the implementation plans of the nine directives. One of the directives expressed that the Department should restructure itself in order to adequately support local governments in the province. The province has not yet done this.

It was also incumbent on the MECs responsible for COGTA and National Treasury to jointly review the work that had been done in terms of s154.

On the District Development Model (DDM), she informed  the Committee that National COGTA had deployed support teams to municipalities. Each district leader was supported by three to four officials. A request had been made to the province to also deploy provincial officials to augment and support these DDM interventions.

Follow-up questions by Members

Mr Hadebe noted that for the first time in attending parliamentary meetings, he had been found wanting. He said that he would have to consult various dictionaries to be able to understand what the MEC was talking about.

He lamented the fact that he ever got a response on the refusal of concurrence in order to bring about stability for the administrators so that they could be able to continue with their work. He also said that he did not hear anything about financial recovery plans.

He added that what had been raised were the challenges and he thought that the interventions would have included the conception and implementation of recovery plans. Could it be that municipalities had been hostile to these economic recovery plans, he asked.

He recalled that Members had been told that economic recovery plans had to be improved on by the Provincial Executive, whereas in other provinces, the plans had been tabled in municipal councils for adoption.

Ms M Tlou (ANC) said that she realised that the state of governance and performance in the North West left much to be desired and that interventions have not yielded expected results.

She asked the MEC what his next steps would be to improve governance and service delivery in errant municipalities. She said that continued interventions resulted in a waste of taxpayers’ money.

She also wanted the MEC to indicate whether rates and taxes were still being paid to the municipalities that had been placed under administration.

Follow-up replies by the MEC

MEC Cwaile noted that the NCOP had the competence to decide on concurrent powers.

He added that recovery plans should be devised by municipalities and submitted to the AG. It was not expected of Municipalities to concede recovery plans.

The provincial government had to review performance agreements as these should speak to the recovery plans.

On protests by community members in municipalities, he said that one had to look at the outcome and deepened poverty. Impressions and perceptions had been many. He said that protestors has been well within their rights to protest over a lack of results. Others protested as they had an “erroneous’’ understanding of what had been happening. He charged that some administrators had been contradictory whereas others had failed to adopt and implement important decisions. Questions about the bona fides of administrators had also been raised.

He noted that when the Financial and Fiscal Commission (FFC) engaged with the province in 2019, it wanted the province to implement an effectiveness criteria for municipalities. As of yet, the province still did not have a mechanism to monitor effectiveness and relied on the AG for that function. He stressed that such a mechanism should also be able to include feedback from the residents of the North West.

Follow-up comments from Mr Motswana

Mr Motswana informed the Committee that the bona fides of the people that had been appointed as administrators left much to be desired.  He noted that one administrator used to be an investor in the Venda Mutual Bank (VBS). In Mahikeng, the administrator had been convicted of 16 previous counts of fraud, two of which had been thrown out on appeal. He questioned how a convicted fraudster could be appointed to such an important position.

In another municipality, a person with no experience other than that she was once a mayor of the Naledi Municipality had been appointed as an administrator. In Madibeng an Advocate had been appointed as administrator, yet the same advocate had not yet investigated how it came to be that councillors bought cookware and paid their personal retail accounts with Municipal money.

His question to the MEC was, whether these administrators had been properly vetted and whether there had been compliance with s57(a).

Closing remarks

The Chairperson called on the MEC, the provincial government and all role-players to ensure that municipalities that had been placed under administration received adequate assistance.  She thanked the MEC, the Provincial Chairperson of the Standing Committee on COGTA and officials for their inputs.

 

The meeting was adjourned.

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