North West Municipalities fail to spend service delivery money

North West Legislature Portfolio Committee on Finance Denounce Failure by Municipalities to Spend Monies Meant for Service Delivery.

The Portfolio Committee on Premier, Finance, Cooperative Governance, Human Settlements and Traditional Affairs led by Aaron Motswana has noted with a huge disappointment the report indicating that some of the North West province municipalities have lost various conditional grants allocated to municipalities for the 2022/23 financial year due to lack of spending. National Treasury has written to MEC for Local Government, Human Settlements and Traditional Affairs, Nono Maloyi publishing names of municipalities that
stands to forfeit their conditional grants.

“What is disheartening is loss of funds meant for water by the Dr Ruth District Municipality whereas local municipalities under it are
heavily affected by lack of water.
The report indicates that R119 453 000 of Regional Bulk Infrastructure Grant (RBIG) will be lost by the Dr Ruth Segomotsi Mompati alone. Other struggling local municipalities
such as Mamusa, Ditsobotla and Moses Kotane failed to spend Municipal Infrastructure Grant (MIG)and there is lack of service delivery in
their areas.

“The Portfolio Committee encourages MEC Maloyi to ensure accountability in this regard, and provide progress on consequence management to the Committee. It is time that failure to spend grants is characterized as treason against the state and communities in their respective constituencies,” said Motswana.

Motswana also added that whilst Dr Ruth Segomotsi Mompati District is advancing spending on water tankering, it fails to spend funds directed to construction and upgrading of water and sanitation treatment plants in their category B municipalities to ensure communities receives water.

“Municipalities are owing huge debts to Eskom and losing the Integrated National Electrification Programme(INEP) and Energy Demand
Management Grant that would have assisted in managing and mitigating Eskom debt by municipalities. MEC Maloyi must act on this negligence and dereliction of duties,” said Motswana.

In compliance with section 38 (2) (b) of the Municipal Finance Management Act, 2003 (Act No. 56 of 2003), National Treasury wrote to
all affected municipalities on 17 February 2023 informing them of the intention to stop portions of their allocations. The municipalities in
the North West Province were afforded an opportunity to submit written representations within seven days upon receipt of the letter. National Treasury went through all the responses from municipalities and decided that the following municipalities will have their funds
stopped for the 2022/23 financial year.