South Africa

Standard of Living

Slim standard of life upgrade for Gautengers

Slim standard of life upgrade for Gautengers
Archive Photo: Gauteng premier David Makhura announces his executive council in Johannesburg on Friday, 23 May 2014. Picture: Werner Beukes/SAPA

Life over the last nearly 10 years is better for more Gautengers – but only just. But if you’re black you’re still playing catch up, and if you’re living in Emfuleni municipality things are getting worse.

These are among the key findings in the fifth edition of the Gauteng City Region Observatory (GCRO)’s Quality of Life Survey 2017/2018 released today.

Another key trend is that, along with the usual suspects of crime and unemployment being chief concerns for the province’s citizens, the new emerging threat, is the impact of drugs and alcohol abuse, especially among the survey’s coloured respondents, has taken over as a top three concern.

Now in its fifth edition, the latest biennial survey has been conducted against the backdrop of a change in president from Jacob Zuma to Cyril Ramaphosa, and on a provincial level the ghosts of the tragedy of the death of mental health patients at Life Esidimeni and the ongoing e-toll saga on the province’s roads.

GCRO director of research, Graeme Götz, presented the findings at the University of Johannesburg on Tuesday, saying that the “province has done well with its slow and steady improvement in the quality of life index over time” against the persistent pressure of lower GDP per capita in recent years at 26.7%. This as well as what he says is the population explosion in the province that sees 1.5-million people added to the head count every five years.

When the survey started in 2009 the index put quality of life at 6.23 (rated out of 10) and this year is at 6.30. However, he also says that breaking down the complexity of the data is crucial to see the more nuanced implications of the research.

Of the municipalities surveyed, it’s Ekurhuleni that’s shown a survey by survey increase in satisfaction of services. Researchers measured this against eight basic services of government provided housing; water; sanitation; waste removal; energy; roads; public health care; and government safety and security services, as well as the cost of municipal services and billing for services.

Johannesburg citizens marked a slight drop in satisfaction in this survey while Tshwane and Emfuleni citizens showed increasing dissatisfaction in service delivery in their municipalities. People surveyed in Midvaal and Lesedi proved to most satisfied with service delivery in their areas, with strong spikes in their rating for services.

Götz says the results show that overall province-wide satisfaction has decreased over the last three surveys, but says there are clear municipal variations in this trend.

Satisfaction with some services is up, but overall decline is mainly driven by lower satisfaction with government provided dwellings, services cost and billing,” he says of reading the research findings for Tshwane and Johannesburg.

With the run-up to the elections around the corner, Götz believes understanding the impact of dissatisfaction is crucial.

What drives dissatisfaction is also what drives responsiveness in whether people will take part in election. When people respond with ‘the country’s going in the wrong direction’ or ‘politics is a waste of time’ they are disengaging and this opting out is a threat to democracy,” he says.

Other key findings from this year’s survey has been more people reported interruption of water services, despite 91% of respondents having access to piped water. There’s been an increase in the number of respondents (about 21%) indicating that an adult in their household skips a meal a day due to lack of money. In the 2013/2014 survey the number was 14% of respondents. One of the new questions put to the respondents in this survey was around their attitudes to interracial dating and marriage. Three-quarters of respondents agree that inter-racial dating and marriage is acceptable.

The survey asked 248 questions to 24 889 respondents over 257 days.

In response to the survey results Premier David Makhura says: “We have gone through a toxic combination of an economy in decline and sustained and increased migration into the province of the last five years, we still have a lot of work to do.

I’m happy that we have this survey that can do its work with autonomy that is free from fear or prejudice and is evidence-based,” he says.

Makhura says intervention and innovation are essential to stimulate job creation in the province and for authorities to tackle crime as the priority concern for citizens. He also says placing the municipality of Emfuleni under administration has proved to be a crucial intervention to turnaround the worsening situation in that municipality. DM

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