Some residents in disbanded and newly-established local municipalities in Limpopo say while they are enthusiastic about voting in the November 1 Local Government Elections, they are still concerned about service delivery.
Several residents in Vuwani in the Collins Chabane Local Municipality say they are worried about the lack of effective service delivery.
While some residents in the disbanded Mutale Local Municipality, whose areas were incorporated into the Thulamela and Musina local municipalities, have written to the Municipal Demarcation Board demanding the restoration of their municipality.
Vuwani, which was part of the Makhado Municipality, became part of the Collins Chabane Municipality in 2016. The decision led to protracted, violent resistance by some residents. Following years of negotiations and intervention by the national government, the matter has been resolved but lack of essential services remains a concern for residents.
Lack of basic services
While they are happy about the construction of a tar road to Vyeboom village, they are concerned about the lack of water supply, roads and unfinished community projects, like the multi-million rand stadium.
One of the residents, Gloria NengweKhulu, says while she is discouraged by the lack of effective service delivery, she is going to vote in the Local Government Elections.
“We experience little service around Vuwani. For example, they installed street lights in town but they are not effective, the road condition is too bad, full of potholes. These are some of the things which might discourage people to vote,” says NengweKhulu.
Municipal performance | Discussing Stats SA’s report on basic service delivery – Part 1
Other residents say they hope government improves the supply of water.
“The entire road is full of potholes so we are not getting services. We vote year in year out in Vuwani but the service we get from government is very poor, we even struggle to get water. We survive through those who have transport, who go around selling water, some end up going to Luvuvhu river to do washing and it is not safe,” says a resident.
The Mutale Local Municipality ceased to exist in 2016. Parts of the 41-ward municipality were integrated into Musina and Thulamela.
Spokesperson of the Mutale Concerned Residents at Mulodi village, Rudzani Netshikweta, says although they are looking forward to voting, they want the decision to dissolve the municipality to be reversed.
“We are going to tell our people to go and vote but we have got a problem with the demarcation board whereby we want our municipality back, because the services that we were having is no longer as we were under Thulamela Municipality now. When we were having our own municipality here the services were provided to us nicely,” says Netshikweta.
Meanwhile, the Collins Chabane Local Municipality says that it is working with residents to complete some of the projects which were left unfinished when parts of Vuwani were removed from the Makhado Local Municipality.
Municipal performance | Discussing Stats SA’s report on basic service delivery – Part 2
