The Democratic Alliance (DA) in KwaZulu-Natal notes with disappointment the province’s year-on-year deterioration of the sustainability of municipal finances.
The latest Municipal Financial Sustainability Index (MFSI) by Ratings Afrika based on the fiscal year ending June 2019 indicates that the financial sustainability in the municipalities in the province is gradually getting worse. KwaZulu-Natal municipalities degraded from 52/100 in 2015 to 41/100 in 2019. With the effects of the Covid-19 pandemic, this is expected to get worse.
While we are disappointed we are not surprised by these reports. The ANC has been instrumental in ensuring that our municipalities drown in debt and, at this rate, we will need resolute strategies to keep us afloat.
At the root of all this, is corruption in these ANC-run municipalities. Until we can root out corruption things are only going to get worse.
The ANC leadership has shown little to no intention to deal with corruption. Instead, they are protecting their corrupt comrades to keep them in power at the expense of the ratepayers.
We never see corrupt comrades getting arrested and convicted for their crimes. We have pending cases and inquiries which are costing us millions but eventually, the media forgets about these cases and so does the Judiciary.
Day in and day out, we report corruption in different municipalities but those are swept under the carpet and we are left at the hands of criminals leading our municipalities.
The Special Investigating Unit (SIU) departments in municipalities are bombarded with cases of corruption on a daily basis but we never see any outcomes. We are at the top for irregular and wasteful expenditure, no wonder that service delivery in our communities is appalling.
The ANC is excelling at protecting their comrades and the poorest of the poor have to pay for it.
Only under the leadership of the DA will this province ever get back on its feet. In the same report, three of the top-performing municipalities in the country are DA-run Western Cape municipalities. They are Mossel Bay, Saldanha Bay, and Swartland municipalities.