Roodepoort’s political animals, voters and candidates alike are feverishly gearing up for the 2016 Municipal Elections on 3 August.
But as politics go, fibs big and small are often told. Party manifestos are the grown-up version of school boys boasting about whose fish is the biggest – in this case it is “we’ll build more houses than you”.
The highly respected fact-checking organisation Africa Check has scrutinised the manifestos of the three major parties contesting the municipal elections – ANC, DA and EFF – to see just how true their claims and promises are. Here are at least three claims made by each party that would make Pinocchio blush::
Democratic Alliance (DA):
• Claim: The City of Cape Town’s rate of unemployment was 20,6 per cent in 2013/14. This was lower than three other major metros, including the City of Tshwane (23,4 per cent), Nelson Mandela Bay (30,6 per cent) and the City of Johannesburg (27,9 per cent).
According to Africa Check this is untrue. The DA admitted to them that it was an oversight and that the heading for the unemployment figures was incorrect as it referred to the unemployment data for October to December in 2015. Regardless, in that year the metropolitan municipality with the lowest unemployment rate was eThekwini at 15.9 per cent.
• Claim: In the 2014/15 financial year, the City of Cape Town spent 67 per cent of its budget in poor communities.
Not true, said Africa Check. According to the organisation, “If the city’s figure of investment in poor areas and informal settlements (R17 504 774 569) is calculated as a percentage of the total latest publicly available 2014/15 budget (R35 458 835 000), the portion the city says it invested drops to 49,4 per cent”.
• Claim: …the Drakenstein municipality managed to reduce annual water losses from 34,8 per cent to 12,1 per cent in little over a decade. The campaign also showcases how DA local governments can reverse the decline of a municipality by identifying problems and taking proactive steps to address them.
Again not true. DA spokesman Phumzile van Damme told Africa Check the figures were supplied by the municipality, which consists of the towns of Paarl and Wellington.
“The municipality was however only formed in December 2000 when the Paarl and Wellington Municipalities were amalgamated. Drakenstein Municipality spokesperson, Mart-Marié Haasbroek, told Africa Check that the figures shared by the DA were from the town of Paarl, located in the Drakenstein Municipality. They could not be attributed to the municipality as a whole,” reported the fact-checking organisation.
Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF):
• Claim: The EFF People’s Municipality will pass by-laws which will expropriate and allocate land equitably to all residents of the municipality for residential, recreational, industrial, religious, and agricultural purposes and activities with the principle of use it or lose it.
But according to Africa Check, “… if the minister of Public Works delegates power to a municipality and compensation is paid, municipalities are allowed to pass by-laws which the public is allowed to review and comment on. But this power doesn’t extend to expropriation.”
• Claim: The EFF’s People Municipality will ensure that there is 100 per cent electrification of every household in the municipality within the [sic] 5 years of being in government.”
Africa Check refuted this, saying informal settlements, migration and rural areas pose an impediment. South Africa’s Department of Energy defines ‘universal access’ as 97 per cent of households being electrified. It notes that “full electrification is unlikely to be possible due to growth and delays in the process of formalising informal settlements”. Robert Cameron, professor at the University of Cape Town’s Political Science Department, described the EFF’s promise as “laudable” but difficult to achieve.
• Claim: “The EFF’s People Municipality will abolish all forms of informal settlements and dwellings and provide adequate human settlements for all.”
Africa Check said that according to the 2014 General Household Survey, 12,9 per cent of South Africa’s 15,6 million households lived in informal dwellings. They cited local government expert Andrew Siddle who told Africa Check that upgrading informal housing was already a long-term goal for South Africa as a whole and questioned how the EFF would fund it.
African National Congress (ANC)
• Claim: “Between 2001 and 2014, the percentage of households with access to piped water increased from 61,3 per cent in 2001 to 90 per cent in 2014.”
According to Africa Check, “The 61,3 per cent in the ANC manifesto seems to indicate only the share of households with piped water in their dwellings (32,3 per cent) and in their yards (29 per cent), as found by South Africa’s 2001 Census. However, the figure of 90 per cent in 2014 includes communal taps and neighbours’ taps. The ANC is therefore not comparing like with like in its manifesto.
• Claim: The proportion of households benefiting from free basic water services increased dramatically between 2007 and 2013. Households receiving free basic water services increased from 7 225 287 in 2007 to 11 794 526 in 2013.
Africa Check said that according to the non-financial census of municipalities. this figure reduced to 5 269 475 in 2013 and 4 633 999 in 2014 – significantly lower than the number contained in the ANC manifesto.
• Claim: Upgraded 95 000 households in informal settlements (2014/2015).
But Africa Check begs to differ, saying “The Department of Human Settlements’ most recent annual report shows that 74 017 households in informal settlements were upgraded with improved housing conditions in 2014/15. This means that individual informal households are provided with basic services, such as water supply, electricity and sanitation [moved out of shacks into formal housing].”
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