Municipalities still lack capability to fill their functions

Cape Town - Most of South Africa's municipalities are still performing less than 50 percent of the functions they are meant to carry out, according to the municipal demarcation board's 2007/08 national capacity assessment report.

But the report notes improvements in overall management capacity. For example, in 2006/07, about 25 percent of municipal managers were found to be in acting positions. This figure fell to 11 percent in 2007/08. According to Local Government Research Centre director Clive Keegan, this drop indicates that new incumbents in these posts are appointed from within the municipality and have some local government experience; they could be moving between municipalities for employment opportunities.

In determining municipal capacity, the board used the legal definition contained in the Municipal Structures Act, which defines capacity as “the administrative and financial management capacity and infrastructure that enables a

municipality to collect revenue and to govern on its own initiative the local government affairs of its community”.

The report notes that nearly 75 percent of the 46 district municipalities and just over half of the 231 local municipalities performed less than half of their functions.Since the initial adjustments of powers took place in July 2003, local municipalities were taking on more of the burden of district municipalities - under which a number of local municipalities fall - rather than moving closer to the intended allocations.

For example, in 2002/03, 47 percent of local municipalities performed the cemetery function - a district function. This proportion rose to 51 percent this year.

The parallel figure for refuse removal rose from 46 percent to 57 percent, the fire fighting function rose from 29 percent to 31 percent and the roads function increased from 24 percent to 33 percent.

The demarcation board - which makes recommendations to provincial and local government ministers - has proposed that 33 percent fewer local municipalities should have the authority to collect refuse, 40 percent fewer should be responsible for roads, 51 percent fewer should have the authority for fire fighting and 40 percent fewer should have charge over cemeteries.

Keegan said that the inability of district councils to carry out these functions was largely to do with the lack of appropriate human resources, rather than budgeting difficulties.

A way of resolving the problems was a proposal that certain municipalities should include a formal urban area - preferably not one that previously fell under homeland jurisdiction.

The board, chaired by Vuyo Mlokoti, noted that operating expenditure at district level had increased significantly between 2002/03 and 2006/07 - another indication that the problems were not a result of lack of financial resources.

Over the six-year period the average district municipal budget in the Eastern Cape had nearly tripled, from about R100 million a year to just less than R300 million a year. Keegan noted that significantly higher budgets for that

province would reflect transfers from the central government to municipalities.

Average district council budgets in KwaZulu-Natal had risen from about R75million to about R200 million in this period, while in the Northern Cape - the worst endowed in terms of district council coffers - budgets had risen from about R30 million to about R50 million.

Average district municipal spending per household has risen from about R1 300 per household per year in the Western Cape in 2002/03 to R2 500 in 2007/08 - the most spent by a province per household and about double the national average of R1 248.

For local municipalities, the national average operating budget for 2007/08 is R175.5 million - with a median result of R70.5 million - indicating the wide variations in expenditure.

Annual budgets for local municipalities in the Northern Cape had risen only marginally over the six-year period, from about R50 million to R60 million.

At the local municipality level, the national average operating expenditure per household for 2007/08 is R5 332.

Again, significant variations are found between provinces, with the Western Cape spending R11 844 a household per year while Limpopo spent only R2 917.