2019-w401 - 22 March 2019

At the beginning of 2018/19 financial year CoGTA identified 87 dysfunctional municipalities that required urgent support. In August 2018 MISA deployed district support teams comprising more than 80 engineers and town planners in 55 out of the 87 identified dysfunctional municipalities. These 55 municipalities were targeted for technical support due to severe challenges in relation to the delivery of municipal infrastructure for basic services. Specifically, they were selected on the basis of the following:

• 17 Municipalities had their MIG transfers stopped at least three times in the past 5 years, including 2017/18;
• 18 Municipalities had their MIG transfers stopped at least twice in the past 5 years, including 2017/18; and
• 20 Municipalities were experiencing different forms of service delivery challenges.

Each district support team deployed in these municipalities is constituted by engineers, construction and project managers, financial accountants, and town and regional planners. The focus of these teams is to build capacity of these municipalities to plan, deliver, operate and maintain infrastructure. A range of support initiatives are being implemented through these teams to enable these municipalities to improve. The support by these teams broadly covers the following areas, among others:

• Technical support on the upgrading of infrastructure;
• Project / contract management support;
• Town Planning / Spatial & Development Planning Support;
• Assistance in the compilation of ‘sector plans’ (master plans, water conservation and demand management, etc.);
• Operations and maintenance support;
• Revenue enhancement strategies; and
• Policy and by-law reviews, Review and assessment of IDP’s and relevance to service delivery.

1. Progress Made in the 55 Municipalities To Date

Our active interventions and support has led to some progress. There are some distressed municipalities that have improved and which in our view deserve to be removed from the list of 55 dysfunctional municipalities. A total of 24 municipalities have significantly improved in terms of performance since deployment of district support teams. The table below provides a list of municipalities that have achieved significant improvements in performance.

Summary of progress made with regard to performance in the 55 municilalities is demonstrated in the following:

• Improvement with the monitoring and in spending of the Municipal Infrastructure Grant allocations;
• Filling of critical technical positions;
• Support with applications for grant funding;
• Improvements in revenue collection through introduction of revenue enhancement strategies, e.g. development and implementation of water conservation and demand management plans for Matatiele, Kou Kama, Mose Kotane, Mafube, Letsemeng, uMzinyathi, Ugu, and Abaqulusi;
• Improved planning and delivery of infrastructure as a result of support provided by the district support teams, e.g. Matjhabeng municipality is being supported with condition assessment of wastewater infrastructure. Ten other municipalities are supported with the development of sector plans, e.g electricity master planning in Madibeng and Spatial Development Framework for Makana;
• Basic service delivery backlogs assessments are being conducted in five district municipalities, namely West Rand, uThukela, King Cetshwayo, uMgungundlovu, and Capricorn.
• Framework contracts are being introduced to improve efficiencies in the procurement of goods and services in municipalities;
• Reduction of adverse audit findings.

A table containing a list of all 55 municipalities highlighting support provided to each one and progress on performance to date is attached as an annexure to the reply.

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