COGTA commends mayoral elections

Friday, August 26, 2016

Pretoria – The Department of Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs (COGTA) says it is pleased that approximately 99% of municipalities across the country have already held their first council meetings, where mayors were elected.

The council meetings were held within the stipulated period of 14 days after the Local Government Election results were gazetted.

According to COGTA, South Africa has three different categories of municipalities: category A - metropolitan municipalities; category B - local municipalities and category C - district municipalities.

“In terms of the law, only category A and B municipalities had to be constituted within the 14-day period.

“To this effect, as government we are delighted that new mayors in this category of municipalities have been elected by councils in their first meetings across the country.

“For the few municipalities that are still to convene their first meeting, we are confident that they will do so in the coming week and we encourage the Municipal Managers to act swiftly in this regard,” said the department.

So far, as COGTA reports, all councils have been established in the Western Cape, North West, Mpumalanga, Limpopo, Gauteng, Free State, and Eastern Cape.

“In KwaZulu-Natal (KZN), majority of councils were established, and we are expecting the two outstanding local municipalities to hold their first meetings.

“In the Northern Cape, the majority of the councils were established, except Kgatelopele and Gamagara Local Municipalities. We expect to see these two municipalities hold their first meetings soon,” said the department.

The department said as of Monday, the district municipalities will begin the process of convening their first council meetings.

“The districts are made up of a number of local municipalities that fall in one district, hence the local municipalities had to be constituted first.

“There are usually between four to six local municipalities that come together in a district council. The district municipality has to co-ordinate development and delivery in the whole district.

“As government, we are convinced that the district councils will also hold their council meetings in due course. We believe that the establishment of the new local government system will assist to take governance many steps closer to the governed,” said the department.

COGTA Minister Des van Rooyen said government believes that municipalities are at the centre of service delivery in South Africa, “hence our continued resolve to continue supporting this important sphere of our government”.

The department said the recent reports suggesting that there is an intention to support municipalities less is not correct and there has never been such a policy decision taken by government.

“As a nation, and all levels of government functioning within a rapidly changing environment in our country, we pledge to support all our municipalities to deliver services to our people,” said the department. - SAnews.gov.za