03 Oct 2017

Ministry of Local Government and Rural Development has taken a deliberate decision to meet and interact with councillors to discuss issues that impact on service delivery counteracting efforts to serve Batswana.

Speaking during the Kgatleng District full council meeting recently, Assistant Minister of Local Government and Rural Development, Ms Botlogile Tshireletso said government continued to spend huge sums of money on projects, but continued to receive reports on project delays.

She said this further cost government millions, which could have been used elsewhere.

“I want to urge you to improve project management.

Let us work together to ensure the quality of our projects is right to avoid losing millions as well as delays in service provision,” said Ms Tshireletso.

Ms Tshireletso said some projects were lagging behind, especially those being done under the Economic Stimulus Programme (ESP 2). She said some have not been started, meaning that work will be done under pressure, thereby compromising the set standards.

She further encouraged councillors as the leadership of the district to take keen interest in such issues and ensure that projects were delivered on time.

The assistant minister applauded Kgatleng District for the good initiative of paving internal roads and more pleasing was that Ipelegeng was engaged in many of such projects.

Ms Tshireletso said her ministry is responsible for management of waste, which entails collection, transporting and disposal of waste from villages and towns.

She said it had come to her attention that most households were not registered for refuse collection, hence litter from homes was disposed indiscriminately on roads, streets and open spaces.

She therefore implored the council to register all households for refuse collection and make sure that mechanisms were put in place to collect litter without fail and engage the community to partake in the exercise.

Ms Tshireletso encouraged the council to embark on a community based refuse management programmes that will be led by village development committees.

She added that councils have to up their efforts in revenue collection.

“You have to come up with strategies to collect government revenue instead of depending on central government for financing.

Prudent financial management is critical and integral to the sustainability of council delivery systems,” she said.

Ms Tshireletso said for councils to be autonomous they have to show that they can be independent and run their own affairs.

She said they could make public private partnership to develop their district and pay attention to stimulating the economic growth in their area.

Kgatleng District Council concurred with the assistant minister that they need to be part of the project supervision, but they were being hindered by the law that prohibits them from being on tender boards.

Councillor for Ntshinoge Mr Thabo Komane said there was need to review the Local Authorities Procurement and Asset Disposal Act so that as councillors they take the responsibility of ensuring that projects were done on time.

He further said project delays were caused by lack of monitoring and further argued for the autonomy of the council.

Councillor for Mosanta, Mr Tona Mooketsi opined that as the committee empowered to visit projects for monitoring purposes, they were hindered by the procedures as they could only make sight visits once in a quarter.

He asked that they be well resourced to visit projects sight often to enhance monitoring for timely completion of projects.

Among other issues, which the assistant minister briefed councillors on was local empowerment and the roles of councillors as people’s representatives. Ends