Municipal managers are at the centre of addressing the crisis in local government and poor services will not be tolerated, Cooperative Governance Minister Zweli Mkhize told the South African Local Government Association’s (Salga) National Municipal Managers Forum in Ekurhuleni on Monday.

“There is no room for inferior services, complacency, incompetence, indolence, dishonesty or mediocrity. The dignity and respect for municipal administration must be restored and be restored fast,” said Mkhize.

“The buck stops here.”

Mkhize touched on the crisis in local government, with his department classifying only 7% of municipalities as well-functioning and only 33 of 257 municipalities receiving a clean audit from the Auditor General.

The minister warned that if municipalities do not fulfil their mandate of providing essential services to residents communities may want to wage another fight against the government, as they did against the apartheid administration.

According to Municipal IQ, service delivery protests have hit an annual high since it started recording protests around 15 years ago, with the breakdown in communication between councils and residents a driving factor.

“If municipalities must change, the municipal managers must be in the forefront of that change. Change in local government is in your hands,” Mkhize told managers.

He said municipalities drive service delivery and senior managers must be competent, professional, and law-abiding.

“Municipal administration should be completely professional, technically competent and must be staffed by motivated public servants whose only interests is the service to our people,” said Mkhize.

“Those who wish to make their first few millions in business while serving as municipal officials or those who wish to use council as preparatory grounds for future political office are in the wrong place,” he added.

“Let us keep it simple in municipalities: leave politics to politicians, business to the private sector and keep the administration to public servants.”

The department of cooperative governance and traditional affairs (Cogta) checks whether appointed municipal leaders are qualified and in the past year approved 423 senior and municipal manager appointments and forced councils to make 95 corrections.

Releasing the municipal audit outcomes in May, Auditor General Kimi Makwetu said the regression in audit results was due to municipal executives and managers lacking accountability, despite his office calling for accountability improvements since at least 2013.

“It is now five years later, and we are still faced with the same accountability and governance challenges we had flagged throughout these years,” said Makwetu.

The Auditor General found municipal non-compliance with regulations was at its highest since 2012/13 and irregular expenditure had ballooned to over R28-billion.

Accountability could improve if President Cyril Ramaphosa signs the Public Audit Amendment Bill, which will allow Makwetu’s office to make binding recommendations and refer financial irregularities to law enforcement agencies for investigation.

Mkhize introduced the Municipal Recovery Plan after his appointment in February. It led to teams of specialists being sent to the worst-performing municipalities to bolster their capabilities.

Cogta is focusing on improving 57 “high-priority” municipalities and spending R57-billion to improve infrastructure and expand services. Those areas account for 87% of households living in informal settlements and backyard dwellings.

The Municipal Recovery Plan has been criticised for rehashing old ideas, with Professor Jaap de Visser, director of University of the Western Cape’s Dullah Omar Institute, writing of the interventions:

“They have been part of Project Consolidate, Siyenza Manje,the Turnaround Strategy, Back to Basics and various other local government support programmes over the last two decades. Perhaps it is a case of doing the same thing but expecting different results.”

Mkhize on Monday reiterated his recent call to look into the structure and responsibilities of local governments.

“We need to decide whether services are better served through municipalities as they are currently structured or whether we need the municipalities in their current numbers or configuration,” he said.

Mkhize said there were perennial challenges in ensuring local governments are sufficiently staffed by qualified professionals: “Incorrect qualifications, inappropriate or bloated staff establishments; unacceptably higher vacancy rates and inordinately long delays in filling budgeted vacant posts, continue to plague local government.”

The minister condemned corruption in municipalities and said the department blacklisted employees who have been found guilty in one local government from working for another.

The DA recently laid criminal charges against Mkhize after it was reported the ANC received an R2-million donation from Vele Investments, central to the alleged looting of VBS Mutual Bank, while he was the party’s treasurer general.

Mkhize has denied any wrongdoing. DM