I want both: You must read and listen. Chair, the slow expenditure of capital budgets by some municipalities is a cause for concern. However, opposition parties participating in the debate today need to locate the discussion in the wider context of the enormous strides the ANC government continues to make towards local government transformation and ensuring that the majority of our people have access to basic services.
During today's debate, hon Lorimer, in particular, of the DA and hon Msimang of the IFP have adopted a very narrow and limited view of what has been achieved at local government level. All is not doom and gloom, as the hon members would have us believe. Let us look at some facts which put the matter in perspective. I have here the latest Estimates of National Expenditure for 2011, which analyse service delivery for the 2009-10 financial year.
It indicates a massive increase in basic services to our people in four main categories. This implies significant capital expenditure taking place during the period, as well as a high level of competency on the part of officials and the political leadership in our municipalities. According to this report, basic services increased as follows over the last financial year: firstly, in terms of basic water, an estimated 1,2 million households that were not serviced in the previous financial year are now provided with potable water. This touches the lives of approximately 5 million of the poorest of the poor.
Secondly, in terms of basic sanitation, an additional 680 970 households have been provided with sanitation.
Thirdly, 965 636 households have been given increased access to roads. This means that approximately 3 million additional people now have access from their homesteads and villages in the deep rural areas of the Eastern Cape, Limpopo, North West and elsewhere to schools, hospitals and places of work. This on its own represents, in my view, a massive developmental outcome. Of course, backlogs in road infrastructure persist. There are still parts of my constituency of Ndwedwe in KwaZulu-Natal where access has not improved since the days of King Shaka, but we are getting there.
In terms of community lighting, 464 183 additional households were connected to the grid over the past financial year. The village of Sonkombo in my constituency is next in line to be connected. A municipal infrastructure grant, MIG, allocation of R20 million has been spent on building an electrical substation in the area. By the end of the year, and for the first time in history, the lights will go on in Sonkombo.
Chair, hon Sogoni has dealt at length with MIG expenditure. I simply want to add that it is clear from the expenditure trends that he refers to municipalities' capacity to absorb funds that has improved significantly since the inception of MIG. The MIG expenditure has succeeded in reducing backlogs faced by many municipalities across the country. Take my district municipality of Ilembe, for example. The water backlogs in 2001 affected over 76 000 households. According to National Treasury, by 2007 this had been reduced by 36 000 households, a reduction of almost 50%. I know that further MIG amounts have been spent since 2007, and I am confident that things have improved even further since then. What is happening in Ndwedwe, Sonkombo and Ilembe is being replicated in villages and towns across all provinces, and the DA and IFP need to take cognisance of that fact. [Applause.]
Chair, we do concede, however, that in some instances capital expenditure is a concern that needs to be remedied, and hon Sogoni has dealt with this at length in his speech. Hon Msimang asks what government is doing. Hon Sogoni has given lists of interventions on the part of government, and I suggest that hon Msimang reads that speech very carefully to understand the interventions that have been made.
That these interventions are succeeding is borne out by the audit outcomes referred to by hon Chiloane when she addressed us. I know that the hon Chiloane is passionate about the need for effective audit committees. She will be very pleased, therefore, to learn that Minister Mthethwa, acting Minister of the department, announced earlier this week, at the SA Local Government Association, Salga, conference in Durban that all municipalities would have to have public accounts committees established by 30 November. This will provide good governance and help achieve clean audits. [Applause.]
Members have expressed concern with regard to capacity constraints, especially with regard to personnel, not only the high vacancy rate in our municipalities, but also the calibre of municipal officers employed. The Local Government: Municipal Systems Amendment Bill was introduced to Parliament to address the professionalisation of local government administration and, when implemented, I have no doubt that it will go a long way towards improving the situation.
Mr Lorimer mentions cadre deployment. Let me say that in the vast majority of cases, those deployed by the ANC to the Public Service meet the very high standards expected of them. However, the Bill makes it mandatory for municipalities to employ appropriately qualified and competent people. Cadre deployment is in any event preferable to the purge of senior, competent and experienced officials, almost always black. That is the first order of business the minute the DA takes over control of a municipality. [Interjections.] An example is Cape Town, in 2006, when the municipal manager and other senior black staff were axed. Purges of black staff happened at the same time in Stellenbosch and Eden. Now they are forcing out - I think he may already have gone - the municipal manager in Knysna. Plettenberg Bay is next. They are trying it with Oudtshoorn, but they don't control Oudtshoorn so they won't get it right. [Interjections.]