STAFF REPORTER|
DELIVERING his State of the Province Address (SOPA), North West Premier Bushy Maape announced that his administration has adopted an Accelerated Service Delivery Programme to change the face of governance of municipalities in the province.
Maape delivered SOPA in the provincial legislature on Friday morning.
The premier said his administration wants to turn the North West in to a working province guided by values and a responsive government.
“We want to turn the North West into a working province guided by values of respect, accountability, professionalism, listening, caring and responsive government. We need to change these negative perceptions of the Province, and this we are doing by developing a new culture of service delivery and good governance,” he said.
He added that “to respond to these challenges past and present, we have adopted an Accelerated Service Delivery Programme, whose unique approach is a joint and collaborative effort to deliver basic services to change the face of governance of municipalities in the province.”
However, the premier said that “efforts of the patriots and many others are often undermined by negative stories, emanating from our Province, stories of corruption, instability, in-fighting, poor service delivery and general perceptions of incompetence.”
He further acknowledged the failures of the administration in the past and present.
He said some people in the province still don’t have reliable water.
“We acknowledge the failures of our past, and in some instances our present. Our people still do not have reliable water in some areas, sewer still flows in some of our localities and some of our roads are still not easily trafficable due to potholes,” he said.
Maape said to resolve all the issues of service delivery stakeholders must work together.
“It is my firm belief that all challenges of service delivery are within our ability to resolve and require government, communities, business and labour unions to work together,” he said.
“If we are unable to resolve basic challenges at a local level, our people will not believe that we can address bigger social challenges of crime, poverty, inequality, and unemployment.”
Maape said: “Failure to deliver basic services, has now escalated and impact economic activities, thereby stifling production capacities of many businesses, and causing further hardships through job losses.”
- * Inside Politics
