Co-operative governance & traditional affairs (Cogta) portfolio committee chair Faith Muthambi has criticised the slow pace of processing a bill that could be a game-changer for dysfunctional municipalities.
Muthambi said on Tuesday the passing of the Intergovernmental Monitoring, Support and Intervention Bill of 2013 is urgent “in light of the cabinet’s decision to intervene in 64 dysfunctional municipalities, with possible dissolutions of some municipalities”.
The bill was sold as a solution to challenges that hinder the implementation of interventions by provincial governments in struggling municipalities.
“There have been successive promises about the tabling of this bill since the formation of this committee. We are now midterm and there has been no tangible movement on the bill, which has been sold as a solution to many challenges that impede successful implementation of interventions,” said Muthambi.
The bill was drafted with the intention of providing for uniform standards in the application of section 139 of the constitution, among other things, the SA Local Government Association (Salga) said in a document released in 2020.
Section 139 empowers a provincial government to intervene in the affairs of a municipality struggling to deliver basic services, the development of policy and initiation of bylaws, or the implementation and administration of legislation related to local government.
“While the constitutional prescripts of interventions are necessary, early warning systems and rapid response teams will ensure that we arrest the challenges of governance, service delivery lapses and functionality of municipalities,” said Muthambi.
DA shadow minister for Cogta Cilliers Brink laid the blame for the delay squarely with the department.
“The bill has not been passed because there is probably resistance to stricter rules about how interventions should take place,” said Brink.
“There is a lack of capacity in the department. There has been absolute chaos in terms of managerial stability, there is a lack of leadership, consistency, and the department is not properly run.”
He said the bill was aimed at giving details on how interventions should take place and guidance on how “successful interventions are to be pulled off”.
Brink said 90% of interventions did not work because “interventions are often abused as an opportunity to loot or settle factional differences in the ANC”.
“The bill is certainly a step in the right direction and given the high failure rate of interventions, you would have thought that [Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma] will prioritise it.”
Co-operative governance & traditional affairs minister Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma’s spokesperson Lungi Mtshali did not respond to a request for comment.
Tabling the local government audit outcomes for the 2019/2020 financial year in parliament in June, auditor-general Tsakani Maluleke said the financial position of just over a quarter of the 257 municipalities in the country was so dire that there was significant doubt they would be able to continue meeting their obligations in the near future.
In 2019, the portfolio committee members raised observations that section 139 was often used as “a political tool to settle scores among party members, and was a result of political infighting and instability within municipalities”.
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