Deputy Chairperson, hon members, I am presenting these two Reports simultaneously, the Termination of Intervention at Emandlangeni Local Municipality and the Termination of Intervention at Nkosazana-Dlamini Local Municipality Reports. The challenge of building a capable state will not be realised without the active participation of the local government sphere in complementing the work of our sovereign, democratic state. Equally, the goals of the National Development Plan remain a pipe dream if the local sphere of government is passively watching in the sidelines.
A capable State requires capable local government institutions that are leaders in the delivery of services for the benefit of local communities. Equally, this call for local government institutions, which are striving to maximise efficiency through good governance,
performance compliance as well as readiness to embrace accountability and decisive action for wrongdoing is central for our system of local government, which is developmental.
The select committee continues to face the challenge of only dealing with Section 139 Constitutional intervention, a system of oversight, which is reactive and thus unable, per our mandate as the select committee to commence with our formal and original programme of oversight, which is essentially proactive. An attribute of the above is the growing number of municipalities whose state of performance, compliance and governance, service delivery and internal municipal instability has deteriorated to the extent of warranting intervention in terms of the provisions of Section 139 of the Constitution.
Chairperson, both Emadlangeni Local Municipality and Dr Nkosazana Dlamini- Zuma Local Municipalities are one such municipality which has been under Section 139 of the constitutional intervention. Subsequently, the inception of intervention in the municipality, the Provincial Executive Council approved a set of Terms of Reference as focal areas of performance improvement. Based on these, a turn-around plan designed and approved to bring the municipality to normality in its operations as well progress.
The MEC responsible for local government in the KwaZulu-Natal province has on 5 March 2019, briefed the select committee on the state of the progress in the municipality as well as the need and desirability to terminate this intervention.
Having regards to the progress made on service delivery challenges, financial management, organisational development, transformation and good governance in the administration of the municipality, as well as the Exit Report. The select committee accordingly recommends the approval of termination intervention invoked in terms of Section 139 (1) (b) of the Constitution in both municipalities.