Local government – too big to succeed

Plenty of local authorities in South Africa just don’t work. Perhaps that’s because we don’t have enough of them.

Corruption, cadre deployment, skills shortages, and poor administration have all been blamed for poor local government performance. Performance varies a lot between municipalities, but for some, solving these problems might not be enough. The problem may be, quite literally, bigger than that.

Some South African district municipalities are larger than many countries and American states. Our largest district municipality, Namakwa (Northern Cape), is larger than the state of New York, which contains 62 counties, each with their own mayor and administration. Switzerland, which is smaller than three of our district municipalities, is divided into 26 cantons, and approximately 2 700 communes. Every canton has its own parliament, government, constitution, laws, and courts.

In 1998 South Africa’s 843 local municipalities were reduced to 284. Older East Londoners will remember the days when Gonubie, Beacon Bay and King Williams Town were their own municipalities. There are now 278 municipalities falling under 52 district and metropolitan authorities. Previously, each municipality would have been responsible for, on average, three of the country’s 2 345 cities and towns. Now this average is more like eight. Is it possible for one local authority to effectively run eight different towns which may be spread over a large area?

The ANC is now discussing plans to abolish district municipalities. What would take their place is currently unclear, but the intention is to address the failings of local government. One idea is to get rid of the existing two-tier system and allocate the powers of districts to local municipalities or provinces. Particularly badly performing municipalities might be absorbed into provincial and national administrations.

Among those badly performing municipalities might be the 66 declared to be in financial distress by the National Treasury — a quarter of all municipalities. Assuming that the party is serious about fixing local government, perhaps the ANC should also be considering decentralisation as part of the solution, not greater centralisation.

Perhaps one of the problems with local authorities in South Africa is that some cover too large an area to work. The local government overhaul should then be considering more, and smaller, municipal areas.