Video: Mayor meets with media editors
The executive mayor, Clr Mondli Gungubele, highlighted Ekurhuleni's progress discussed at the recent Lekgotla where the municipality reflected on its plans to become a region known as a delivering, capable and sustainable city.
The executive mayor of the Ekurhuleni Metropolitan Municipality (EMM) met with editors from Caxton East Rand and South on Thursday in Boksburg, where he explained when taking office in 2011, it was done with certain priorities and commitments in place, including building local economies, improving local public services and access to services,building united, non-racial, integrated and safer communities, promoting community participation in local government and building an effective and accountable government.
“We worked with various sectors, stakeholders and constituencies to revise and identify an inclusive and broad-based Growth and Development Strategy (GDS 2055), which is anchored on five strategic imperatives,” said the mayor.
These are re-urbanisation to achieve sustainable urban integration, re-industrialisation to achieve job creation and economic growth, re-generation to achieve environmental well-being, re-mobilisation to achieve social empowerment and re-governing to achieve effective co-operative governance.
“We agreed to align our work with the 10 pillars of the province to modernise, transform and re-industrialise the Gauteng region over the next five to 15 years. We are going to be active players in this formation. It is made up of economic, decisive spatial and accelerated social transformation, transformation of the state and government, modernisation of the public service, economy, human settlement and urban development, public transport infrastructure and re-industrialisation of Gauteng and taking the lead in Africa’s new industrial revolution,” said the mayor.
He added that the premier has given the EMM a mandate to lead in the area of township economies, Aerotropolis and re-industrialisation. The EMM will then identify areas in which province will assist the metro.
Communication
Clr Gungubele said the EMM resolved that it must engage more with its residents.
“Our communication must be engineered with the target audience in mind. The only way we can earn credibility from our communities is by obviating uncertainty through communication. Critical in this area is our call centre.
“There is a need to elevate our efforts in fighting corruption. Progress has been made but if we do not tighten things up, it will undermine our ambitions as a government. The involvement of the Special Investigations Unit (SIU) and our resolve to strengthen our internal audit department is producing the required results,” he said.
The mayor agreed that response times by departments to call centre queries is the metro’s Achilles heel.
He said improvement on turn-around is urgent. He said “good work” is happening at the metro’s call centre, however departments’ responses to call centre queries need to be addressed.
Replacement, repair of aging infrastructure
The mayor said the EMM cannot have continuous, major water and electricity outages. He agreed residents “deserve quality and sustainable services”.
He announced to editors that infrastructure “is a major priority and funds must be allocated accordingly”.
Digital
He said the metro aims to fast-track the roll-out of Wi-Fi in communities.
“We have resolved that strategic land parcels and spatial planning are key. In order to strategically attract investment and add value to land, the metro is finalising the release of key strategic land parcels. This will enable Ekurhuleni to engage directly with a range of potential investors that will assist in bringing modernised spatial morphology.
“Through the introduction of Regional Spatial Development Frameworks (RSDF), the metro seeks to decisively transform space through a modern, spatial development model. This is done through the Municipal Spatial Development Framework (MSDF) that provides six urban planning management areas.
He also announced a “robust tourism development strategy” to Ekurhuleni benefits from this sector.
“It is not acceptable that even with the advantage of the OR Tambo International, our share of the tourism market that comes into Gauteng is only 18 percent. Economic development must leverage on our tourist attraction. We must elevate the potential of this city,” said Clr Gungubele.
“Although Ekurhuleni’s regional economy has continued to demonstrate resilience wherein in 2011, 27 927 jobs were lost, compared to 16 850 and 34 900 jobs created respectively in 2012 and 2013. However, there remains a major concern in respect of the EMM’s performance in the creation of short-term jobs compared to the city’s inherent capacity.
“It should be internalised and embraced that the Ekurhuleni economy is at the centre of Premier David Makhura’s strategic programme, hence the implementation of flagship projects such as the revitalisation of township economies, revitalisation of the manufacturing sector, Aerotropolis development and urban regeneration cannot be delayed.
“Furthermore, the implementation of projects such as the Prasa-Gibela Plant, the Tambo-Springs Inland Port and the Transnet Sentrarand facility, among others, must be fast-tracked.
“In addition to the imperative of ensuring that Ekurhuleni has a highly skilled human capital which is employable and enterprising in nature, it is critical that the role of investment facilitation should pre-occupy all structures of the municipality in order to create a favourable business environment that contributes towards redressing the socio-economic challenges that the regional economy confronts.
“While we continue to plan and explore other interventions that could prove effective in redressing the current socio-economic challenges facing our city, community works programmes and a comprehensive food bank programme should be implemented without delay in order to provide a safety-net to the poorest-of-the-poor.
