By Lehlohonolo Lehana.
City of Johanneburg Executive Mayor Kabelo Gwamanda says his administration has embarked on a journey of restructuring, making tough decisions and implementing strategic reforms to ensure it stuck to its core municipal mandate of service delivery.
Gwamanda delivered his maiden State of the City Address in Johannesburg council on Tuesday. He giggled throughout the heckling and paused several times to refocus.
This comes as the city has been facing a service delivery crisis, poor financial management and disputes between political parties in the past year.
Gwamanda said coalitions under the Democratic Alliance (DA) have been unstable and focused only on settling political scores instead of providing service to the residents of the City .
He outlined plans to “foster transparency, civil engagement, the city’s vision and keeping with strategic priorities.”
Gwamanda said the city is taking steps to ensure that “every rand in our budget is utilised effectively”.
“By the end of June 2021, the Government of Local Unity’s (GLU) audited financial statements reflected a city with a healthy cash balance of R6.6 billion.
“Upon our return in January 2023, from the multiparty government, we found a near bankrupt municipality sitting with over R6 billion in unpaid supplier invoices… Without a financially sound city, we will not be able to deliver basic services to our residents,” he said.
Energy
On Monday, council Speaker Colleen Makhubele said during last year’s State of the City Address, the previous administration in the City of Gold prioritised the stabilising of electricity supply and fixing road infrastructure.
With the administration having been booted out of power, it was unable to complete some of the plans outlined by then-mayor, Mpho Phalatse, during her State of the City Address.
But Makhubele said that Gwamanda would have to outline a comprehensive strategy to address preserve the city’s status.
“Mitigating the impact of planned outages by Eskom is a matter that is receiving our urgent attention through City Power,” Gwamanda said.
“There is no doubt that energy plays a critical role in promoting economic growth, reducing poverty, and enhancing the quality of life for all our residents.”
Gwamanda said one of the measures already implemented is the approval for City Power to extend its power purchase agreement with Kelvin Power Station.
Kelvin Power Station provides 13% of the city’s electricity, while 87% comes from power utility Eskom.
“This added power will serve as beneficial to our residents, more especially, during the winter peak period we are now entering, as we anticipate a significant growth in demand. Working with the province, we are determined to improve the energy mix and availability factor for the city and potentially the Gauteng province at large.”
Water
Gwamanda said there is also investment in water infrastructure.
“One of our service delivery imperatives is that Joburg Water continues to invest in building and upgrading the bulk water infrastructure.
“The city will implement a geyser installation accredited training programme in all regions of the city, targeting 140 residents as part of our comprehensive skills development strategy,” he said.
Crime
On crime fighting in Johannesburg, Gwamanda stressed that the city will recruit about 2 000 crime fighting wardens.
“These dedicated individuals will work alongside law enforcement agencies, communities, to strengthen crime prevention initiatives, improve community policing, and enhance safety and security of our city.”
He assured that he would not let the city fall victim to criminals.
The premier gave the same motivation for spending millions of rands to recruit crime-busting wardens.
In period of two months, Premier Panyaza Lesufi’s government employed close to 4 000 people, who were given uniforms and fast German cars to help curb crime in communities.
Human Settlements
The mayor said the development of Southern Farms has been approved and the development agreement has been finalised.
“After a long process, the implementation of the Southern Farms project will finally commence in the 2023/24 financial year.
“Through collaboration between the three spheres of government, Lufhereng has been allocated additional funding by National Treasury to boost the construction of infrastructure in the ongoing housing development.
“In March 2023, council approved 181 recognised informal settlements to be upgraded including identification of suitable land for de-densifying congested and densely populated areas,” he said.
In addition, he said, the City would make an effort to focus on job creation because, in his view, there is a link between crime and unemployment.
He said small businesses should be supported and an environment should be created where they can create job opportunities.
“We’re determined to create an enabling environment. We will be contributing to the creation of job opportunities for the youth. We need to provide access to funding and build a link between government, businesses and communities,” Gwamanda said.
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Video Courtesy of COJ.