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A new dawn
for municipal delivery
A
s the world rebounds from Covid19, one of the key drivers for future success is unity towards a common purpose. In South Africa, we’ve witnessed sterling examples of solidarity in practice. Examples include food assistance programmes, as well as the mining sector’s proactive stance to step in and vaccinate its own workforce. If anything, the July 2021 unrest in Gauteng and KwaZulu-Natal has further strengthened, rather than derailed, this process as the public and private sector come to grips with the practical realities of stabilising and growing South Africa’s micro and macro economy. With the Local Government Elections now having come and gone, hopefully this will also help to prioritise spending on essential infrastructure like water and sanitation, and accelerate renewable energy programmes. New municipal leadership structures – many managed through coalitions – can now demonstrate their ability to alleviate bottlenecks that have historically impeded project delivery. These include cancelled tenders that have already been advertised, as well as wasteful and fruitless expenditure. Rather than purely scoring clean audits, let’s hope that future Auditor-General South Africa reports reflect prudent expenditure against budgets, supported by positive revenue streams based on more efficient billing and the collection of rates and taxes. Hopefully, 2022 will be the beginning of the end for illegal connections and the non-payment culture that has threatened to push many municipalities into bankruptcy. With a workable plan in place, municipalities can and will be a vital catalyst in revitalising South African construction.
Developing a roadmap From a future planning perspective, having an accurate statistical base is crucial so that policy and plans synch with what’s really happening
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Infrastructure News
The official magazine of the Institute of Municipal Engineering of Southern Africa
INFRASTRUCTURE DEVELOPMENT • SERVICE DELIVERY • ROADS • BUILDING • MAINTENANCE
INDUSTRY INSIGHT Groundwater management and the community
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on the ground. For this reason, it’s vital that Statistics South Africa’s Census 2022 campaign, scheduled for February 2022, is as comprehensive as possible. This will be the fourth census since 1994 and will help to provide a clearer picture of how many people are estimated to be living in South Africa – documented and undocumented – the extent of unemployment, and the mix between informal and formal housing. As outlined in the 2021 Medium-term Budget Policy Statement, the fiscus will remain constrained. The upside is that there’s a concerted focus on bringing down gross loan debt to around 78.1% of GDP by 2025/26. Achieving this will require a concerted effort to rein in the public sector wage bill and reduce social grant expenditure in place of sustained employment. In terms of the latter, high-performing sectors like agriculture have huge potential to create skilled and semi-skilled jobs, and SMMEs. Within the construction sector, there are major expectations that planning and preparation will translate into more projects in 2022. Certainly, within the roads segment, there are various newly and soon-to-be awarded Sanral projects. These include Sanral’s approximately R485 million Eastern Cape Special Maintenance Project on the R56 from Indwe to Elliot and from Elliot to Maclear, which is scheduled to commence in January 2022. Major new work is also imminent on the N3 KwaZulu-Natal section bordering Pietermaritzburg. The past 18 months or so have certainly been taxing. However, I’m highly optimistic that 2022 will be a good year for infrastructure, as policy and practice come together, spurred on by a fresh perspective on municipal delivery.
Dr Kornelius Riemann
Managing Director, Umvoto Africa
Urban Planning & Service Delivery
Needs versus resource-based approaches
Hall Longmore launches SA-developed FBPE coating system
Cover opportunity
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Water & Wastewater Overstand O&M contract sets the standard
2021 IMESA / CESA Excellence Awards Municipal engineering at its best I S S N 0 2 5 7 1 9 7 8 Vo l u m e 4 6 N o . 1 1 • N o v e m b e r / D e c e m b e r 2 0 2 1 • R 5 5 . 0 0 ( i n c l . VAT )
IMIESA November/December 2021
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