Acting Minister Nathi in Eastern Cape on Mandela Day.
Minister Nathi Mthethwa with thembeka Pama launching Clean Cities.
Allow me, in the first place, to say how pleased and honoured I am to be here. I convey, too, the very good wishes of Minister Sicelo Shiceka. Both of us want to stress that we think IMFO is a very important partner of ours, and we hope that you will have a very successful and rewarding Conference.
I thank you too for asking me to speak on the issues of service delivery. This topic has to preoccupy all of us, not just government and IMFO. We're all in this together. That's really my main point today. And that's the main point of the LGTAS (Local Government Turnaround Strategy). If we together effectively implement the LGTAS, we will go a long way to improving service delivery and development. And if we improve service delivery and development, we will also be strengthening the LGTAS.
While I will speak about service delivery by government in general, my main emphasis will be on service delivery by local government, as this is an IMFO (Institute of Municipal Finance Officers) Conference and because this is the main concern of the Department of Cooperative Government and Traditional Affairs (CoGTA). Clearly, it would not do to speak of service delivery without linking it to development. To ensure significant improvements, service delivery programmes must be part of the IDPs (Integrated Development Plans). Moreover, we are committed to building a developmental state, and this is not possible without significant improvements in service delivery.  So I will often speak about both service delivery and development together - and for the sake of simplicity and to save time not necessarily rigorously.
The scale of the service delivery challenges at municipal level has been set out in the LGTAS.  Only 54% of the country's population has access to all the 4 basic services of water, sanitation, electricity and refuse removal. This ranges from 88% of the people in the Western Cape to 15% of Limpopo.
Obviously, the responsibility to improve service delivery in these 4 areas and in respect of the other functions of municipalities does not reside with local government alone, and has to involve provincial and national government as well.
Clearly, we have to accelerate service delivery. We have no choice. For, as much as we have made significant progress since 1994, we have simply not done enough. And the people, who are the ultimate judges, have announced their verdict repeatedly through the constant service delivery protests and in other ways. Of course, it is government as a whole, all three spheres, that is being accosted by the people, but it is local government that is being most directly confronted. That is understandable, given that people have most direct access to local government.
But it would be wrong to think that local government alone is responsible for service delivery failures. Yes, local government councilors and administrators must take their fair share of blame for the failures. But so too must politicians and administrators in the provincial and national government spheres.  In fact, the service delivery and other community protests reflect the failures of cooperative governance as a whole, not just local government. In any case, many of the issues that the protesting communities raise are not primarily the responsibilities of local government, such as housing, jobs, crime and education, but are provincial and national government functions.
However, it is not government alone that is responsible for the service delivery inadequacies. The people too are. We are a developing democracy. We are a developmental state. In our context, the state is nothing without the people. And we simply will not be able to deliver effectively without the active participation of the people in governance, especially in the local government sphere. In fact, the legal definition of a municipality is that it comprises not just the councilors and administrators but the residents as well. This means that the residents of a municipality have certain rights but they also have responsibilities. And while residents must claim their rights, they must also fulfill their responsibilities.  Their key responsibility is to play a role in their governance.
How many residents are active in Ward Committees or School Governing Bodies or Community Policing Forums How many residents attend public meetings of the municipality How many residents respond to requests from municipalities for comments on draft policies?
Of course, many municipalities do not encourage public participation. Some even fear it. Most municipalities do not allocate resources to ensure effective public participation. But then people should demand their right to participate. That right is in the law. And that right was won by ordinary people through titanic struggles before 1994.
While it is true that municipalities are mainly to blame for the poor public participation, residents must take their fair share of blame too.
Government and the state as a whole often delivers in a top-down bureaucratic manner, with people being passive by-standers, instead of taking a measure of responsibility for delivery. This has served to demobilize people and encourage a sense of dependency on the state.
And when people mobilize, they do so not so much to gain access to the state and also take some responsibility for ensuring service delivery and development, but to make demands of the state. It is partly this approach that is reflected in the burning down of schools, clinics, libraries and halls during protests, even if the frustrations of people are understandable, and their rage difficult to control. In a significant sense, it reflects people making demands of the state without assuming a measure of responsibility. Sometimes it may be that it is easier to destroy a building than painstakingly take part in Ward Committees and other structures of public participation to get what you want.
This cannot be the basis of a vibrant, effective developmental democracy. The state has to do more to create space for ordinary people to become more active in service delivery and development. And the people have to wage the necessary struggles to ensure that they create their own space too.
As part of the process of encouraging greater public participation, we are to strengthen Ward Committees. The Department of Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs (CoGTA) is engaging with other Departments and other stakeholders to secure consensus on key proposals in this regard.
Expanding the Ward Committees and ensuring that they represent a greater diversity of civil society interests.
Ensuring that proposals of Ward Committees are processed by municipal structures.
Allocation of a CDW (Community Development Worker) to each Ward Committee to serve as a CEO of the Ward.
Increasing the material resources allocated to Ward Committees.
Setting up Ward Committee sub-structures in which residents actively participate.
Encouraging Ward Development Plans that are incorporated into IDPs (Integrated Development Plans) and providing for Ward Committees to oversee service delivery and development in a Ward.
Of course, this will not happen overnight. But these and other proposals can be phased in over time, taking into account budgetary and other constraints.
To accelerate service delivery, we have to have clearer targets, more effective monitoring and greater integration and coordination across the spheres of government. Government is very serious about accelerated service delivery. This 5-year term of national and provincial government constitutes the do-or-die years. If we do not significantly improve service delivery and development in this term, government credibility will be severely dented. The President has repeatedly stressed this.
And it's more than just words. By the end of April, the President concluded Performance Agreements with clear targets and time-frames with each of the Ministers. This is very unusual in the way a head of government manages the performance of a cabinet, but it's most welcome. Most Ministers had by the end of September finalized Delivery Agreements with relevant departments and other partners. As CoGTA we finalized our Delivery Agreement on 30 September. Minister  Shiceka signed the Delivery Agreement with the MECs for Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs and the MECs signed the Agreement with the Mayors. The South African Local Government Association (SALGA) is, obviously, a crucial partner.
CoGTA's overarching objective - outcome 9 as it's known - is "a responsive, accountable, effective and efficient local government system". This is to be achieved through 7 outputs, each of which is accompanied by indicators and proposed activities.
Implement a differentiated approach to municipal financing, planning and support.
Improving Access to Basic Services.
Implementation of the Community Work Programme.
Actions supportive of the human settlement outcomes.
Deepen democracy through a refined Ward Committee model.
Administrative and financial capability.
Single Window of Coordination.
Three of the above outputs deal directly with improving service delivery - improving access to basic services; deepening democracy through a refined Ward Committee model; and creating a single window of coordination. Of course, the other 4 outputs are also relevant.
Through the Performance and Delivery Agreements, the targets are more transparent and can be better monitored. This provides the basis for more effective service delivery and development.
To ensure accelerated service delivery, there has to be better co-ordination. Hence CoGTA will aim to serve as a single window of coordination of the plans, programmes, projects and activities of the national and provincial government departments that relate to local government.
CoGTA is also seeking consensus on several policies and legislation that will provide for greater coordination of the three spheres of government. One proposal is a "Monitoring, Support and Intervention" Bill that will give effect to sections 100 and 139 of the Constitution. Section 100 provides that legislation may be passed to regularize national government intervention in provinces and section 139 provincial government intervention in municipalities.
The Bill would mainly aim to provide a uniform framework for how provincial government should intervene in municipalities. Currently, provincial governments usually intervene when a municipality is teetering on the brink of collapse. The Bill would seek to provide for early warning signals and for provincial intervention in municipalities before they become dysfunctional. The Bill would also provide for more active national government support for provincial governments in their monitoring of, support for and intervention in municipalities. With provincial and national government more directly involved in local government, and with higher levels of cooperation among the three spheres of government, the prospects of accelerating service delivery would be greater.
At least one of the several reasons that service delivery is not adequate is the lack of technical skills. These include planning, project management, engineering, financial and other skills. As mentioned earlier, one of CoGTA's 7 outputs is on administrative and financial capability.
CoGTA is undertaking a major skills audit of municipalities. We have identified six municipal posts to be critical: the Municipal Manager, Planner, Chief Financial Officer, Head of Engineering/Technical Services, Human Resources Manager and Communications Manager. If these posts are not filled by competent, motivated people, service delivery is seriously hampered.
CoGTA is keen to establish minimum qualifications for senior municipal managers and to professionalize municipal administrations. We have introduced the Municipal Systems Amendment Bill to parliament as part of this.
As this is an IMFO Conference, I will focus on the need for more effective financial management skills in municipalities. Clearly, for service delivery to be accelerated, there have to be significant improvements in the financial management of municipalities. IMFO therefore has a crucial role to play in improving service delivery.
CoGTA launched the "Operation Clean Audit" campaign which seeks to ensure that all municipalities get unqualified audits by 2014. We are also encouraging municipalities to establish Municipal Public Accounts Committees. Obviously, these are very challenging goals to achieve and much, much more effort is required to fulfill them. We feel that IMFO could do more to advance these goals, and we urge you to do so.
Establish and maintain effective governance to ensure proper risk management and adequate internal controls.
Maintenance of adequate financial management systems in order to produce accurate and complete financial statements and performance information.
Ensure the timely submission of Annual Financial Statements to the Auditor General and tabling of the annual reports to Councils.
Facilitate the training of municipal managers and other non-financial managers in financial management.
Intensify training on ethics management to ensure officials in local government behave ethically when discharging their official duties.
The CoGTA Delivery Agreement also stresses the need to reduce municipal debt. Much more has to be done to get businesses, government and residents to pay their debts. Government simply must lead in this regard and pay its debt. CoGTA is going to put increasing pressure to ensure this. CoGTA cannot do this alone. Municipalities must also do more to ensure accurate and regular billing. They should also constantly "name and shame" government departments that are not paying debts that are legitimately owed to municipalities and they should more vigorously confront these departments.
development of generic debt-collection by-laws.
The Delivery Agreement also refers to the need to reduce municipal over-spending on operational expenditure and under-spending on capital expenditure, and to increase spending on repairs and maintenance. The Agreement sets out the need to develop and implement differentiated support programmes for municipalities to improve cash flow management in line with national targets.
Clearly, for service delivery to be accelerated, we have to have the necessary technical skills in municipalities, and, indeed, all three spheres of government.
In CoGTA's "The State of Local Government Report" published in October last year, we referred to the harmful effects of political in-fighting on the ability of municipalities to deliver on their constitutional mandate. The LGTAS that derives from that report seeks to address this challenge. We need to implement the provisions of the LGTAS to provide greater stability in municipalities. Aspects of this include providing greater clarity on the roles of the Mayor, Speaker and Chief Whip; the professionalization of the relationship between councillors and administrators; providing for a more constructive relationship between political party and municipal structures; and a degree of separation of the executive and legislative structures of municipalities.
For service delivery to be accelerated, the political factionalisation of municipalities has to be significantly reduced. But also, the more councillors and administrators focus on service delivery and development, the less likely they are to become factionalised. The more, indeed, that Ward Committees and other structures of public participation are strengthened the greater the prospects of reducing political in-fighting. As the 2011 local government elections loom, councillors will be under greater pressure to ensure accelerated service delivery. It is important that the momentum created by this is sustained beyond the elections and becomes a permanent aspect of the way municipalities function.
For service delivery to be accelerated, corruption has to be tackled far more effectively. We need to expedite changes to the supply change management process and the many other anti-corruption measures we have been speaking about for so long. The responsibility to deal with corruption resides with all of us, but ultimately it's the politicians who must lead. The more we reduce corruption the greater the prospects of improved service delivery, and the more we improve service delivery, the greater the prospects of reducing corruption.
There are aspects of the local government model and our system of cooperative governance that might also be impeding effective service delivery and we need to review them. For example, increasingly, the value of the current two-tier model of District and Local municipalities is being questioned. There are other aspects of the local government model that might be too cumbersome and might need to be simplified to facilitate more effective service delivery. There is also a lack of clarity  in certain areas of service delivery about what precisely the respective functions of provincial and local government are. In fact, there needs to be greater clarity on the respective powers and functions of all three spheres of government in certain areas. The current policy review being finalized by CoGTA needs to be expeditiously processed.
CoGTA is also spearheading a major review of legislation passed since 1994 that has had the unintended consequence of impeding service delivery. There is duplication of provisions in different pieces of legislation, and sometimes these provisions are contradictory. The lack of alignment of legislation between sector departments, and between spheres of government has resulted in conflicting legislation, over-bureaucratisation and onerous processes that serve to undermine effective and efficient service delivery and development.  In good measure, these problems have arisen because of a lack of effective cooperative governance. It often takes up to 4 years between the decision to build houses and the actual beginning of the project. While ensuring active community participation and the meeting of environmental and other standards, the process of service delivery and development needs to be simplified and more expeditiously faciltated.  CoGTA, has with the cooperation of departments in the national and provincial spheres and local government, identified over 60 pieces of legislation that need to be amended as part of this project.
Clearly too, the systems of local government finances and intergovernmental fiscal relations need to be reviewed. While it is certainly true that many municipalities do not make the most productive and effective use of their current resources, it is clear that if municipalities are to accelerate service delivery, they have to have more funding and other material resources. The review of the local government financial system underway needs to be expedited. In fact, this matter will be raised tomorrow at the Joint MINMEC that CoGTA and National Treasury are to have tomorrow.
For service delivery to be accelerated, there also needs to be greater clarity on policy issues regarding basic services like electricity and water. How, for example, is the electricity distribution industry being restructured What is to happen about the proposed REDs (Regional Electricity Distribution) structures?
Ultimately, we come back to the main point being made. If we are to accelerate service delivery, not just in local government, but all spheres of government, we have to significantly strengthen our cooperative governance system. We also have to be clear that the state alone cannot accelerate service delivery and development, and that the active participation of ordinary people is indispensable. So too is the participation of major stakeholders like the trade unions, private sector and other civil society organizations.
The establishment of the National Planning Commission and the finalization of the country's overall national development plan will also assist to accelerate service delivery and development.
The consolidation of the LGTAS is also vital. Within the national framework provided by the LGTAS, municipalities have shaped their own municipal-specific, customized Municipal Turnaround Strategies (MTAS). To date, 280 of the 283 municipalities in our country have submitted their MTAS to CoGTA. However, only about 50% of them have their MTAS adopted through council resolutions and have integrated them into their IDPs.  Obviously, the MTAS differ in quality across the municipalities and many of them need to be improved. But that so many municipalities have done them at all is significant. CoGTA is assisting municipalities to improve on their MTAS and to advance the process.
We can all play a role in this regard. I come back to this repeatedly. Greater cooperation and collective action are vital to accelerate service delivery and development. Now what about IMFO What more are you going to do to assist in the process In fact, important in much of our work is IMFO - more perhaps than you realize. We urge you to come to terms with very valuable role you can play and, even more, we urge you to fulfill this?