The following speech was delivered in Parliament’s debate of the 2019 State of the Nation Address.
Honourable Speaker;
Honourable Members;
Fellow South Africans;
Mr. President, during your maiden State of the Nation address you quoted Bra Hugh Masekele’s song, asking the country to send you. South Africans indeed sent you.
Now, with very little to show as the leader of this nation, you want South Africans to go to sleep and dream.
For 25 years, Makana Municipality residents have been dreaming of a better life. Their dreams have been shattered at every turn. The President himself was recently in Makhanda to celebrate Freedom Day. Traffic lights that were not working for months were fixed in haste, in anticipation of the arrival of the first citizen of South Africa.
The citizens of the City of Saints have been subjected to constant threats of electricity cuts by Eskom due to the municipality’s inability to pay their energy bills, with continuous default on payment arrangements made with the power utility.
Most residents pay their monthly service bills yet find themselves having to remove their own rubbish because municipal workers do not arrive for work. Residents sometimes have to drink water with traces of the deadly E. coli bacteria – this being a result of the poor state of our water reticulation system.
The City of Saints is now the City of Potholes, with illegal dump sites, rubbish strewn in every street, uncaring management, maladministration and corruption. uDr. Zweli Mkhize no Honourable Pam Tshwete bangandingqinela ukuba ndithetha inyaniso emsulwa kuba sele besuka kuzibonela ngawabo amehlo imeko abantu baseRhini abaphila phantsi kwayo.
Sadly Honourable Members, the architect and initiator of the Makana rot was promoted by the governing party and is now with us in this House as an MP.
However, the same cannot be said about the tenure of a DA government on the other side of the historic Fish River valley. During the 2016 Local Government elections, the voters of Nelson Mandela Bay (NMB) chose to vote for change by electing a leadership of clean governance and transparency.
In a short space of 10 months after the DA-led coalition government assumed office, NMB was voted as the second most trusted metro according to the South African Customer Satisfaction Index – as opposed to the 2nd last position our predecessors comfortably occupied the previous year.
During the two financial years of 2016/2017 and 2017/2018, we managed to spend 100% of our allocation of the Urban Settlement Development Grant (USDG) funding. This led to National Treasury further allocating R170m and R200m in appreciation of a job so well done. Unfortunately, matters are less positive with the current NMB leadership. With a week before their financial year-end, they have only spent 62% of the USDG funding and 50% of Capital Expenditure.
An Integrated Public Transport System for the 2010 FIFA World Cup, at a cost of R2 billion was abandoned by the then ANC government. After 18 months in office, the DA-led coalition in NMB got those buses moving.
In an effort to make the city a lot safer, we employed and trained 114 metro police, as well as introduced a ghost squad whose primary mandate was to curb bad or illegal driving. Before we left City Hall, residents felt a lot safer.
We spared no effort in fighting corruption, not only in words but through action as well, because where the DA governs, we don’t tolerate or promote people that steal from the poor. Umve umntu emi kweliqonga esithi iimpuku azityiwa, kodwa zivele ngemisila kuye emlonyeni.
A number of municipal officials identified of wrong doing were either fired, charged or placed on suspension. Some of those officials have been brought back by the current administration, obviously, to let them continue their wrong doing by picking up from where they left off. Indeed, birds of the same feather, flock together.
I have spoken to a number of residents in NMB, all of them recall the realities of the DA-led coalition, and are calling for its return.
Ngalomazwi malungu abekekileyo, lomthendevu waseMampondomiseni, ithole leenkuzi zakwaKrancolo, ooMgema, ooMsiza, ooMbuyeni, izinto ezadl’ amanzi oMthatha onombiza ndisuse undibek’ entla nababantu besiza, uyatshayaaaaaa!