Minister of Water and Sanitation Nomvula Mokonyane has supported a call urging municipalities to improve their management systems.

Chairing an interactive panel discussion on collaborative governance, planning and delivery during the Presidential Local Government Summit 2014, Mokonyane supported President Jacob Zuma’s call for municipality officials to serve people better and effectively.

The panel consisted of, amongst others, the Premiers of Gauteng, David Makhura, and KwaZulu-Natal, Senzo Mchunu, as well as the Executive Mayor of the City of Cape Town, Patricia de Lille.

 

Improving management systems

Mokonyane pointed out in her support for the president’s call that strong moves should be made to focus on building capable and committed municipal administrative systems and processes.

Zuma made the call during his speech at the Presidential Local Government Summit, urging municipalities to improve their management systems moving forward, to get better audit reports. He said this can only be achieved if municipalities ensure that their officials possessed the necessary minimum skills.

“Government has responded to improve professionalism and the management of local government by introducing amendments to local government legislation, for example the Municipal System Amendment Act,” he said. “Chief financial officers should be skilled in what they are doing, engineers and other technical staff should also be experts in what they have been employed to do.”