Sol Plaatje must turn streetlights on for festive season
| by Grantham Steenkamp, MPL – DA Northern Cape Spokesperson of COGHSTA |
| Date: 24 July 2020 |
| Release: Immediate |
| Note to Editors: Please find attached soundbites in English & Afrikaans from Grantham Steenkamp, MPL. The Democratic Alliance (DA) in the Northern Cape is calling on COGHSTA MEC, Bentley Vass to do much more to ensure that municipalities in the province efficiently and effectively spend the emergency funding allocated to them, including funding specifically directed towards sanitation purposes.This comes after it was revealed earlier this week, during a parliamentary briefing with Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs (COGTA) on its adjusted Budget and Covid-19 intervention, that municipalities across the country had shown a low spend on funds allocated for temporary sanitation and decontamination of selected public places, as well as waste and refuse removal.In this regard, the Northern Cape was amongst five provinces that had apparently recorded zero expenditure despite funds already having been transferred in May for a six-month period.It is then no wonder that a number of licensing centres took ages to reopen, as one can assume that municipalities did not prioritise the sanitation of these and other facilities, that deliver important services to the public, despite available funding.At the same time, there have been reports of the dumping of Personal Protective Equipment (PPEs) within the Sol Plaatje municipal, area. Surely, this is where these funds are intended to be used, to implement a coordinated response to the collection of such hazardous waste, as well as to prevent dumping and further contamination of the environment?It is a serious charge against Northern Cape municipalities to have failed to spend emergency funds, within a whole three months of being allocated these funds. If municipalities don’t spend the allocated money soon, we will risk losing this money to other provinces. This is something that the Northern Cape can ill afford.The DA will submit a request to the COGHSTA portfolio committee, requesting that we urgently find ways to monitor municipalities’ expenditure of emergency funds in real time.Given increasing corruption, mismanagement and general inefficiencies, more must be done to ensure that all emergency funds are spent on their intended cause, and on nothing else, and also that they do not sit and gather cobwebs, at the cost protecting lives and livelihoods. |
| Media Enquiries |
| Grantham Steenkamp, MPLDA Northern Cape Spokesperson of COGHSTA071 797 6292 Shelley De WittResearcher082 847 1387 |
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