Staff Reporter
The Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) party has expressed concern at the state of municipalities in the Free State, claiming there is probably no functional municipality in the province.
EFF provincial chairperson Mandisa Makesini told a media briefing in Bloemfontein today that corruption was at the heart of the poor service delivery that has left many communities without access to basics such as water and sanitation.
She said her party is ready to take on the ANC in the forthcoming local government elections and ensure people receive better services.
“We are going toe to toe this local government election,” said Makesini.
“Service delivery is all but a myth in this province. Across all the regions there is no exception to the other. You would swear that they are competing to be worse than the other,” she added.
The EFF provincial leader said the Free State has had no functional municipalities for the last five consecutive financial years.
She said the Auditor General has also indicated that in all municipalities, consequence management was not happening.
Makesini singled out Mafube, Metsimaholo and Maluti-A-Phofung local municipalities as well as Mangaung Metro as some of the worst run.
“Mafube is arguably one of the worst run municipalities in the country. They did not submit their financial statements in time and have not been audited for two previous financial years, and before that received three consecutive disclaimers,” she said.
“Metsimaholo basically has no municipality – the municipality has been under administration for more than the last two financial years, and the intervention has not yielded the community of Metsimaholo any benefit.”
Makesini said the metro has been so badly managed that it has been downgraded twice since 2019 by ratings agencies.
The municipality is also under administration.
Last Wednesday, the national Department of Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs (CoGTA) told parliament in a detailed report that the Free State has 11 dysfunctional municipalities.
It said a further 11 are medium risk and only one is low risk.
The Free Stater has asked the provincial CoGTA office for an outline of the state of municipalities in the province and what’s being done to improve them.
The EFF also said it successfully elected its councillor candidates and submitted their names to the Independent Electoral Commission.
The ANC, however, may fail to field candidates in at least 32 municipalities across the country after it failed to submit its candidates’ names on time.
In the Free State, about 52 names of candidates in Lejweleputswa and Thabo Mofutsanyana districts were reportedly not submitted on time while others had errors.
Meanwhile, the EFF also said it has approached the office of the Public Protector to investigate a partnership between the provincial Department of Education and the Kagiso Shanduka Trust (KST), founded by President Cyril Ramaphosa.
EFF provincial secretary Bosanku Msimanga said it wasn’t true that the education department and KST entered into a 50-50 partnership to build classrooms at different schools in the province.
He claimed the department simply awarded the project to KST without inviting any competitive bids.
This, according to Msimanga, resulted in irregular expenditure of R500 million and that KST only contributed R280 million to the deal.
But KST has previously denied this saying it committed R100 million to a school development project in the province in 2013.
It said to date it has contributed about R280 million.
The provincial education department has also denied any wrongdoing.