Mashaba’s budget for the poor

The Johannesburg Finance MMC Rabelani Dagada gave the first budget speech for the 2017/18 financial year on 23 May at the Chamber of Council in Braamfontein.

The budget is the first in the City’s history which has been prepared by a coalition government.

As Mayor Herman Mashaba had said previously, he would focus on a pro-poor government and 60 per cent of the R55.9 billion budget will go towards the poor.

More than 84 per cent of the budget is dependent on revenue raised by the City and as such, the City has implemented the Back Office Unit, which is a part of the revenue department to address all billing queries.

Providing adequate housing was one of the key focuses of the budget and Dagada has allocated R66 million to the Site and Service project which will see fully-serviced plots of land being assigned to beneficiaries.

Fifty-one informal settlements will also be upgraded over the next three years with R115 million allocated to the upgrades. The informal settlements will be provided with water and sanitation, roads, street names and electricity.

A significant portion of the budget will also go towards the upgrade and repair of existing infrastructure in the city such as power lines, repairing broken traffic lights and fixing potholes.

More than R100 million has been allocated to the repair of traffic lights and R79 million has been allocated to ‘fight the war on potholes’. It is the City’s goal to ensure that 90 per cent of traffic-related faults are addressed within 24 hours.

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Other budget allocations mentioned during the speech include R30 million allocated to drug rehabilitation centres, R9.5 million will be allocated to shelters and a centre for skills development and R10 million for the construction of an Early Childhood Development Centre.

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