The implementation of Msukaligwa Municipality’s Integrated Development Plan (IDP) and Budget consultation meeting, due to the coronavirus, will probably go down in history as one of the most unorthodox to date.
Council conversed by presenting the IDP and Budget by way of virtual council meeting as opposed to the usual meetings conducted in community halls and other venues.
Be that as it may, council used the opportunity to highlight the achievements and challenges the municipality faces as well as discussing future projects planned in the 2020/2021 financial year.
In the council’s opening statement, the public’s demand and expectation for services to be rendered and more development to be undertaken were discussed.
Council said that these demands and expectations were at times difficult to meet considering they have limited resources most of the time.
This scenario, according to council, calls for closer interaction and appreciation of the diverse expectations, while always being mindful of the generation gap and the various communities’ lifestyles, all the while ensuring an acceptable standard of service delivery, maintenance and upgrading.
They also stated that council has embraced the financial recovery plan as an incentive rather than an imposition through studying and trying to grasp the causative factors behind the municipality’s financial affairs.
This included delving deeper into monthly reports, analysing all revenue and expenditure details, establishing a raft of internal committees and workgroups, and convening several break-away sessions.
Other agenda points discussed:
- Housing projects in Breyten and Wesselton as well as the regulation of land-use to facilitate property development
- An electrification programme that will be implemented by Eskom that would benefit 46 households on various farms within the Msukaligwa Municipal area
- Rotational load shedding that might last to August due to the impact of winter and the increased demand
- The upgrading of a substation in Breyten, which will likely not be soon due to the suggested cost thereof.
View the municipal finance performance statement as well as the suggested projects for the 2020/2021 financial year below:
Read the complete article in the Highvelder Newspaper.
