The front page article “Parastatals owe millions,” Daily News, Wednesday 15 August 2018 refers.

Eyewitness News (EWN) reported in May 2018 that “more than 40% of municipalities, 112 of them, cannot afford to carry out service delivery for this financial year.”

Most citizens in our country are conscientious of paying their taxes and rates, many even make sacrifices to do so and generally don’t involve themselves in any form of chicanery not to.

Consequently, it is unnerving when one comes across articles where such huge amounts of debt between parastatals and municipalities - or vice versa - exist.

Service delivery – or rather the lack of it – inevitably falls within this dynamic and there is growing civic dissatisfaction with the quality of local government.

Whether directly or indirectly civic protests are a result and violence erupts on the part of participants or the authorities.

Local government is a constitutional imperative in South Africa.

Our country’s constitution requires municipalities to be responsive, accountable and inclusive.

There needs to be expedient intervention by provincial and national government to address this.

Thursday, 16 August 2018
Darul Ihsan Media Desk