By Simon Nare
Deputy President Paul Mashatile has revealed some of the government’s plans to intervene at certain municipalities to ensure that service delivery is achieved.
Mashatile revealed in a question and answer session in the National Council of Provinces that an extended joint meeting was held on Tuesday where ministers, deputy ministers and premiers agreed that service delivery needed to be executed timeously.
He said the meeting committed to more involvement from the executive and the provincial government in ensuring that District Development Model was implemented.
Mashatile pointed out that when Finance Minister Enoch Godongwana delivered his medium-term budget, he revealed that 50 of the 257 municipalities had an active financial recovery plan.
He admitted that this number was quite low.
“The minister also highlighted that three municipalities are under national intervention. I had a meeting with both Minister of the Department of Co-operative Governance and Traditional Affairs, Velenkosini Hlabisa, and Minister of Water and Sanitation, Pemmy Majodina.
“And we discussed how best we can strengthen support to municipalities through the implementation of the District Development Model. To this end, the ministers have announced measure to address challenges to municipalities,” he said.
Mashatile revealed that the immediate interventions included completing a R260 million water project in Makana municipality in the Eastern Cape.
He added that some of the municipalities identified for immediate intervention included Ditsobotla in the North West, Kopanong and Mafube in the Free State, Emfuleni in Gauteng and Thabazimbi in Limpopo.
Mashatile committed the government to continue with its financial support for infrastructure development to distressed municipalities so that they could deliver essential services.
“We can see we are getting somewhere. So, let us make sure that we look at all of them. So, we are looking at this thing. In fact, minister of water and sanitation and myself also visited Limpopo not long ago. We went to Giyani and at that moment we were looking at water challenges.
“We are engaging many of these municipalities, but as I said early in the year (2025) I will talk to the two ministers (Hlabisa and Majodina) to come to the NCOP and brief you about the good work that they are doing,” he said.
Godongwana acknowledged that, given the scale of the challenges, it was not feasible for the national government to intervene in all municipalities simultaneously.
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