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The Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs, MEC Sihle Zikalala has welcomed the intervention by the uMzumbe Local Municipality, which will cover the costs of the funeral of the Mkhungo family, after the incident that occurred over the weekend where the family is alleged to have been refused the right to bury their mother in a parcel of land in uMthwalume, along the South Coast, by an Induna. 

This incident led the family, to have to return the body of their loved one to the mortuary. 

Following the intervention of MEC Zikalala, who directed the department to investigate the matter, several interventions have been rolled out by the provincial government to assist the family. 

These interventions include:

• psychosocial support to the family for the traumatic experience that they went through. 
• Profiling of the households in line with Operation Sukuma Sakhe so that the department of Human Settlements can assist the family with an RDP house

The uMzumbe Local Municipality will incur the costs for the funeral, which will now take place tomorrow, 18 August at a municipal cemetery. 

Issued by the Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs, MEC Sihle Zikalala

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The Department’s values of transparency, integrity, professionalism and objectivity were displayed by MEC Sihle Zikalala when he appeared before the South African Human Rights Commission (SAHRC) in Durban on Tuesday, 16 August.

The Commission is currently conducting an inquiry on access to water in the Province of KwaZulu-Natal.

During his appearance before the Commission, MEC Zikalala, accompanied by senior departmental officials made a substantive presentation on the state of water provision within the Province.

“Currently, access to water in the Province stands just under 80%. There are an estimated 425 000 families that still do not have access to water according to a 2020 study by the Department on access to water” said MEC Zikalala.

MEC Zikalala apprised members of the Human Rights Commission of the state of access to water in the Province.

In addition to painting the picture of Household Water Access in KwaZulu-Natal per District, he further alluded to the Provincial Water Master Plan which identifies short, medium and long-term interventions to ensure water security in KwaZulu-Natal for domestic consumption, agriculture and other economic activities.

The MEC’s presentation paved a way for meaningful and robust engagements with the commissioners present during the inquiry where the MEC further unpacked the province’s Water Master Plan.

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The Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs, MEC Sihle Zikalala has called upon the management of the department to prioritise the interests of communities through efficient, effective and trustworthy support to the institution of traditional leadership and the sphere of local government.

This morning, MEC Zikalala met with the department’s management at the Cogta Mayville Offices where he outlined his vision for the department and the kind of work culture he would like to see take place within the department.

This was the first of a series of engagements that the MEC will have with both internal and external stakeholders, as the MEC familiarises himself with the environment.

As a department that is also tasked with the coordination of disaster response within the province, many communities rely on the department to ensure that interim and long-term relief is rolled out in an effective manner that takes into consideration their human rights.

In his remarks, the MEC emphasised the importance of professionalism in how staff conduct the affairs of the department.

On the sidelines of the meeting with the management, the MEC also met with the Development and Planning Planning Branch which comprises the Business Units that deal with Local Economic Development, Disaster Management, Municipal Infrastructure and Municipal Planning.

In his input during this meeting, the MEC called upon the Units to prioritise innovation and embrace new ideas as they grapple with improving the economy of municipalities, disaster response and the roll-out of basic services such as water, sanitation and electricity to communities.

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The Western Cape Disaster Management teams that assisted the province of KwaZulu-Natal when it faced the floods in April and May have been honoured by the Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs, MEC Sipho Hlomuka, during a special visit to the Western Cape during a benchmark and appreciation visit.

The visit is part of efforts by the department to honour and appreciate the brave men and women that made up the advanced search and rescue teams and engineers that were deployed by the western cape government to assist the province when it faced the biggest natural disaster in the countries history.

The appreciation ceremony took place at the Western Cape Provincial Disaster Management Centre, in Cape Town, where the MEC for Local Government, Environmental Affairs and Development Planning, Mr Anthon Bredell together with the MEC Hlomuka president over it.

In his remarks, MEC Bredell emphasised his province’s commitment to working closely with KZN on areas of mutual interest when it comes to disaster risk mitigation. “As coastal provinces, we face unique challenges, which require us to closely work together through agreements that will assist us to find practical solutions to the challenges that we face in our respective provinces. Through these partnerships we will be able to put our economies on better footing” said MEC Bredell.

“As the provincial government in KZN, we felt it appropriate that we come to this province to officially express our gratitude for the support that was given to our province during a very difficult period which led to the loss of 456 lives with 82 people still missing. We strongly believe that had it not been for the interventions and additional support we got from our sister provinces, the situation could have been worse. The intervention brought about by the advanced search and rescue teams from the Western Cape saved many lives and ensured that recoveries can be done” said MEC Hlomuka.

During the appreciation ceremony, 13 search and rescue members and 1 engineer were given certificates of appreciation in honour of their role in assisting the province of KZN during the floods.

The visit also saw officials from both provinces share best practices on disaster management.

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The MEC of Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs, Sipho Hlomuka, welcomes the arrest of seven men who have been found in possession of copper and cables that are worth an estimated amount of R1.5 million. 

The information which the department received, indicates that on the 25^th of July 2022, a specialised multi-disciplinary task team comprising of the South African Police Service (SAPS), the Passenger Rail Agency of South Africa (PRASA), Metro Police, Transnet, Telkom, and Eskom, discovered an illegal scrap metal dealer in Ntuzuma A-Section. The dealer was discovered manufacturing traditional three-legged pots using copper and cables that are said to belong to eThekwini Municipality and Transnet. 

The specialised task team raided the house in Ntuzuma following a tip-off that they had received. Upon arriving, they found several stripped copper cables. The suspects were charged with being in possession of the stolen property and for participating in various illegal activities. 

The MEC said while the country is still faced with the issue of load shedding, the theft of cables will continue to negatively affect communities as they will be left without any electricity supply and communication network. 

MEC Hlomuka says that these arrests are a clear indication of the dedication of law enforcement agencies in addressing the scourge of economic infrastructure-related crimes. He says the arrests send a strong message about the government’s commitment to fight crime and prevent further damage and loss to public infrastructure. 

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The brave men and women from the Provincial Disaster Management Centres (PDMC) of Gauteng and Mpumalanga were honoured by the Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs, MEC Sipho Hlomuka during a special two-day visit to these provinces. 

The visits which took place on 12 and 14 July, provided the MEC Hlomuka an opportunity to honour the search and rescue teams for their service when the province of KZN was faced with the April floods, which left a trail of death and destruction. It also provided an opportunity to benchmark best practices applied by these provinces. 

Speaking during the Gauteng leg, which was held at the PDMC of the Province in Midrand, where MEC Hlomuka handed over certificates and medals to the disaster teams, MEC Hlomuka thanked the teams for their selfless service and dedication.

“The people of KZN are grateful for the services that you provided during one of the most difficult times in our province’s history. We will never forget what you have done for us. Through your efforts, many lives were saved. Many families were able to bury their loved ones all because of your recovery efforts” said Hlomuka who was accompanied by senior officials from the department including the Deputy Director General for Development and Planning Ms Barbara Mgutshini, representing the Gauteng Cogta department was its Acting HOD Itumeleng Mokate.

The benchmark aspect of the visit, saw officials from both provinces interacting and sharing best practices for Disaster Management. This part of the visit provided Cogta KZN officials with valuable insights into how the team from Gauteng deals with disasters in the province.

MEC HLOMUKA THANKS MEC NDLOVU FOR THE ENGINEERS THAT ASSISTED THE PROVINCE

The Mpumalanga leg of the visit took place on 14 July at the Mpumalanga PDMC in Mbombela. 

KZN Cogta MEC Hlomuka together with his Mpumalanga counterpart MEC Mandla Ndlovu led the deliberations which centred on deepening ties between the two provinces and sharing best practices on disaster management. 

MEC Ndlovu, in his remarks during the engagement, expressed solidarity with the people of KZN for the loss they have suffered as a result of the April Floods.

“As Mpumalanga, we stand with the people of KZN, when the province was facing calamity we could only do that which was in our power to help through sending donations and engineers. We are saddened by the loss of life and pray that the people of KZN rebuild their lives” said Ndlovu.

In this visit, MEC Hlomuka expressed gratitude on behalf of the people of KZN and thanked the Mpumalanga government for coming to the aid of the province through the support that was provided.

An appreciative token was handed over by MEC Hlomuka to MEC Ndlovu.

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The youth of today are the leaders of tomorrow, this is a quote that is often ascribed to the former president of South Africa Dr Nelson Mandela.

The statement conveys a simple truth about the importance of young people in the present and future of any country.

As a continent, Africa generally has a fastest-growing youth population in the whole world, with South Africa alone having a youth population of 20.6 million, which is 35% of the country’s population.

These statistics differ when compared to those of countries which are situated in the Global North, who have an aging population where the youth accounts for just above 10.3% of their population.

The negative implications of having a young population in the country, is that they happen to be the most affected by the inequalities inherited from the past. This is prevalent in the high youth unemployment rates, poverty which often makes it a challenge to access education; particularly higher education, and the last being the state of health.

Unemployment and poverty are mostly higher for those young people who often stem from rural-based areas. These are the same young people who, having noted the difficulty of surviving in low-income households, move to cities to seek employment or education. As Dr Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma asserted during her remarks at the KZN Local Government Indaba, this shows that, “besides local government being the most important sphere, this is where resources should be spent”, and I add to say, this is where young, capacitated people ought to be injected.

As the sphere of government closest to the people, local government provides an ideal opportunity for young leaders to connect with their communities and to deal with first hand the day to day issues faced by normal citizens.

This is vital in crafting servant leaders who will be able to connect with the needs of their communities and work hard to put the interest of their communities first.

The famous american football coach, Vince Lombardi once said  “Leaders are made, they are not born. They are made by hard effort, which is the price which all of us must pay to achieve any goal that is worthwhile”.

As the department Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs, we strongly identify with the words of Lombardi, in that leaders are made, they are not born. It takes deliberated concerted efforts to produce the kind of leaders that we need, more especially within the sphere of local government.

This is the reason why we convened the Youth in Local Government Summit which we held on the 25^th of June in Newcastle where we invited young councillors, ward committee members, internship holders and beneficiaries of programmes such as the Expanded Public Works Programme.

The Summit focused on the local government’s role in uplifting the youth and finding practical solutions to improve the roll-out of services to our communities.

The summit was made up of high-profile panellists such as the Chairperson of SCOPA at Parliament Mr Mkhuleko Hlengwa, MP; the Chairperson of the Higher Education, Science and Innovation Portfolio Committee Ms Nompendulo Mkhatshwa, MP; the Chairperson of the KZNCOGTA Portfolio Committee Ms Zinhle Cele, MPL;  the chairperson of Committees at the KZN Legislature Mr Sboniso Duma, the former Chairperson of the KZN Provincial House of traditional leaders Inkosi Chiliza and Inkosi N Zulu of kwaNodunga who is one of the youngest amakhosi in the province.  

In his remarks, Honourable Duma, MPL called on young people to demand their place as the country grapples with the issue of economic transformation, and push for the implementation of measures such as a sovereign fund, which can be an important tool in the transformation of our society. 

In his remarks, Mhlengwa, MP called for the youth to be given the space to represent young people, saying “Representation must not just be numerical but it must be substantive, qualitative, efficient and functional so that it makes the required impact in the spaces of representation”.

These sentiments resonated well with the 500 young people that were attending this summit, each of whom had their own hopes and desires for what needs to be done for young people to emerge as leaders in various sectors of society.

Placing young people at the forefront of local government thus means renewing re-modernising and repositioning the sphere of local government. It also means an implementation of new and relevant ideas in establishing adequate economic activities within our communities.

Already we have begun to see what is possible when young councillors and mayors are chosen, this can only be a tase of what is to come as we see more of our young people leading in the important of sphere of local government.

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Opinion Piece

Mr S.E Hlomuka

MEC: Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs

The community of eMpangisweni in the Abaqulusi Local Municipality ward 4, now has electricity for the very first time, this is thanks to the intervention of the Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs, MEC Sipho Hlomuka, whose department quickly responded to the plight of the 101 households, who had never had electricity before. 

On Friday, 15 July, MEC Hlomuka paid a special visit to this community. He officially switched on the Cogta-funded electrification project which brings the modern-day convenience of electricity to households. 

Speaking during the switch-on, MEC Hlomuka hailed the community for their cooperation during the roll-out of the project, “when we visited this community in January, to officially introduce the contractors that we had appointed to this project, we made a plea to the community that there be no disruptions in the implementation of the project, which would have compromised the timelines which we had set. Our visit here today, would not have been possible, had the community not played its part in ensuring that the contractors can get on with their work with no disruptions” said Hlomuka. 

One of the beneficiaries of this project, Thabisile Zondo (62), who lives with her husband, daughter and four grandchildren, hailed the project as a life changer for her village, as they will now be able to store groceries that require cold storage and be able to charge their phones which will allow them to be more accessible to their friends and employers. 

“As a community we are grateful, we will no longer have to fetch firewood in order to cook. I can safely say that our lives will drastically improve because we now have electricity. The life of burning candles is now in the past and our grandchildren will now be able to do their homework without worrying about lighting” said Zondo. 

During the visit, MEC Hlomuka was accompanied by Inkosi Zondo, of the eMpangisweni Traditional Council, who also commended the department for responding with speed to the plight of the community. 

“Access to electricity is a reality today for our community, to many of us it is like a dream come true. We are thankful to the department of Cogta for implementing this project” said Zondo. 

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The Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs Minister Dr Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma has called for municipalities to strengthen the capacity of their local economic development business units.

The Minister was speaking today, at the local government Indaba which was hosted at the Durban ICC.

According to the minister, municipalities have to improve the functioning of their respective LED units to help bring direct investment. Which will in turn assist to create jobs and stimulate the economy.

“As municipalities, you have to continue to attract investment, this is the only way in which you can ensure that you build your rates base. This is a task that municipalities should be seized with since the current funding model does not allocate sufficient resources to municipalities” said Minister Dlamini-Zuma.

The Indaba was attended by Premier of the Province Sihle Zikalala and brought together mayors, exco members, MPAC chairpersons, senior officials in local government and state-owned entities such as Eskom and water boards.

In his remarks, the Premier called upon municipalities to build financial management systems that are resilient and will comply with all prevailing legislation.

The Premier also commended the municipalities that have consistently built robust systems which ensure that public finances are protected and utilised appropriately as indicated in the latest audit outcomes from the Auditor General.

“We should learn from Ukhahlamba which continues to lead our province in attaining clean audits. The AG noted that although three municipalities in KZN obtained clean audits, this did not translate into improved service delivery per se”, said the Premier.

Zikalala also called for municipalities to address issues raised by the AG. “The report of the AG shows that political instability, inexperienced officials and system-related challenges led to the poor opinions at the three disclaimed municipalities, all of which were under administration. Inkosi Langalibalele, for instance, was again disclaimed in 2020-21 mainly due to challenges relating to its amalgamation”.

During the panel discussions various stakeholders such as the police, Eskom, the KZN provincial house of traditional leaders, the department of water and sanitation and the Auditor General engaged with delegates on topics such as good governance and accountability.

The key theme that emerged from the discussions is the need for local government leaders to ensure that capacity building takes place within their respective municipalities, this ensures that the municipality is better able to deliver services to communities efficiently and effectively.

The issue of public participation also came under the spotlight during the discussions, with municipalities being called upon to take their communities into confidence whenever they have service delivery challenges.

“If we fail to inform our communities about our challenges as municipalities we are shooting ourselves in the foot and aggravating those situations as communities end up protesting purely because they do not have updated on service delivery programmes,” said MEC Hlomuka.

“We do not wish to see more protests in our communities hence the call that we are making today that councillors should convene meetings with their respective communities” concluded Hlomuka.

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Fire breaks to be rolled out across the province following the successful launch of the provincial winter season disaster awareness campaign, which was held at Obuka, in the Mthonjaneni Local Municipality today.

The launch marks an important chapter in the rollout of the provinces disaster risk mitigation plan.

Through the campaign communities are educated on several issues, such as:

• Correct use of generators, gas, candles and paraffin stoves;
• Veldfire awareness;
• House fire and informal settlements fire awareness
  *Strong Winds;
• Illegal connection;
• Drought; and
• Snowfall

The launch of the campaign comes as the province grapples with the weather conditions brought about by the winter season.

During the launch of the campaign, we visited the Mpungose family where we oversaw the burning of firebreaks by our disaster management teams.

The firebreaks prevent runaway fires from reaching human settlements.

The department in partnership with municipalities is rolling out the firebreaks in rural communities as part of the winter season disaster risk mitigation strategy.

During the launch MEC was joined by Inkosi Biyela who commended the department for rolling out the programme in his community, which is one of the most affected areas especially by veld fires and lightning strikes.

Through this campaign the department of Cogta will work closely with disaster management teams at municipal level and Non Governmental Organisations to educate communities.

Issued by the MEC for Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs, Sipho Hlomuka

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