Rustenburg – Nine municipalities in North West have lost various conditional grants allocated to municipalities for the 2022/23 financial year, due to lack of spending.
The Portfolio Committee on Premier, Finance, Co-operative Governance, Human Settlements and Traditional Affairs chairperson, Aaron Motswana, said he had noted with a huge disappointment, the report from national Treasury indicating that some of the North West Province municipalities had lost various conditional grants for the 2022/23 financial year.
"What is disheartening is loss of funds meant for water by the Dr Ruth Segomotsi Mompati 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 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 and there is lack of service delivery in their areas," Motswana said.
"The portfolio committee encourages (Co-operative Governance, Human Settlements and Traditional Affairs) MEC Nono Maloyi to ensure accountability in this regard, and provide progress on consequence management to the committee.
“It’s time that failure to spend grants is characterised as treason against the state and communities in their respective constituencies,” said Motswana.
He said the Dr Ruth Segomotsi Mompati District was advancing spending on water tinkering, if it failed to spend monies directed to construction and upgrading of water and sanitation treatment plants in their category B municipalities to ensure communities receive water.
“Municipalities are owing huge debts to Eskom and losing the Integrated National Electrification Programme 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," he said.
Motswana said 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 February 17, 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 Dr Ruth Segomotsi Mompati District Municipality, the City of Matlosana, will have their funds stopped for the 2022/23 financial year.
The DA in North West said the decision to stop the conditional grant to North West municipalities was a heavy blow to service delivery.
DA North West spokesperson on Co-operative Governance, Human Settlements and Traditional Affairs, Freddy Sonakile, said the decision to withhold conditional grant funding was informed by the poor performance of municipalities against the requirements of each grant allocated to the province.
"The Dr Ruth Segomotsi Mompati District Municipality, the City of Matlosana, and the Rustenburg, Moses Kotane, JB Marks, Madibeng, Ratlou, Ditsobotla, and Mamusa local municipalities will accumulatively lose R460 million in conditional grant funding," Sonakile said.
"Madibeng is the biggest loser with a cut of R145,408 million, followed by Dr Ruth Segomotsi Mompati at R119,453 million and Rustenburg at R65,341 million. JB Marks and Matlosana are also in the top five worst affected municipalities losing R59 million and R26 million respectively."
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