The South African Institute of Race Relations has implemented a Municipal Outreach Project, which was launched on 30^th January 2009. The project is co-funded by the European Union, the Friedrich Naumann Foundation for Liberty, and the Institute. The project aims to strengthen the institutional and participatory development capacity of local government in South Africa, and in so doing to aid local government to combat poverty in South Africa’s municipal districts.

Extensive research on the developmental challenges faced by municipalities will be conducted, and the findings will be distributed to the municipal councillors and officials, and development organisations. Information is also available on the project website, www.eumunicipaloutreach.org.za.

Workshops will be conducted in each of the eight targeted municipalities. The first of these workshops will be the Major Urban Poverty Challenges Identification (MUPCI) workshops which will identify specific poverty challenges in each municipality. The Urban Poverty Intervention (UPI) workshops will take place during the second year of the project, and will explore policy interventions appropriate to the challenges identified in the MUPCI workshops. The Anti Poverty Intervention Implementation Proposals (APIIP) workshops will take place during the third year, and will be aimed at identifying the most effective means to implement the policy recommendations.

A weekly newsletter is published on the project website, and e-mailed to beneficiaries. A monthly Fast Facts for Local Government (F3LG), which provides updates on policy developments and socio-economic trends, is posted to project beneficiaries, and published on the project website. The annual South Africa Survey, which is published by the South African Institute of Race Relations, will be posted to beneficiaries, and extracts posted on the project website.

All these resources are made available to municipalities to assist them to combat poverty, which was cited by the minister of finance, Mr Trevor Manuel, as one of the five principles of the national budget, in his speech to parliament this week.

Although many municipalities cite insufficient funds as the reason for the inadequacies in service delivery, most of them operated budget surpluses during the 2007/08 financial year. Some 42 of the 52 metropolitan and district municipalities had operating surpluses.

Despite the pressure of the global economic downturn on our country’s resources, the budget still made significant strides in increasing the capacity of local government. Municipalities in 2009 will receive an additional R2.5 billion for basic services. A further R5.3 billion was made available for municipal infrastructure and bulk water systems. The finance minister proposed that the general fuel levy should form part of a new municipal revenue arrangement to replace the earlier Regional Service Council levies. Moreover, 23% of the general fuel levy will be allocated to metropolitan municipalities to add to the expenditure on roads and transportation.

In the past three years, the municipal infrastructure grant programme has spent about R32 billion. Over the next three years, infrastructure grants to municipalities total R67 billion, and a further R45 billion will be spent on the Breaking New Ground housing programme.

The budget allocation to local government is sufficient for the specific tasks of local government as per the constitution, although this tier of government often lacks the capacity to best use their allocated funds to implement strategies to combat poverty

Echoing the minister’s words: it’s not the amount of money allocated to programmes or departments that provides relief, but how this money is spent to improve the quality of life of the poor, “It’s what the money buys that matters”.

-Nthamaga Kgafela