2005-11-19,+Top-down+governance,+Business+Day+editorial

Business Day, Johannesburg, Editorial, 18 November 2005 = Top-down governance =

FROM the perspective of a neutral observer, tweaking SA’s provincial boundaries to get rid of cross-border municipalities makes all the sense in the world.

They complicate governance and fiscal planning, reduce administrative efficiency and interfere with the co-ordination of national and provincial poverty alleviation and infrastructure development programmes.

Unfortunately, the main actors in the bitter dispute over government’s attempt to resolve the cross-border issue — the communities concerned and Local Government Minister Sydney Mufamadi — do not have the luxury of being able to assess the situation from afar, and they are certainly not neutral.

In the case of the former, this is entirely understandable since the decisions that have been made could have a profound effect on their lives. As a government minister, Mufamadi is obliged to make tough decisions that will not always be popular. But he is also a politician, and cannot avoid accounting for the political implications of those decisions.

There is a reason that shifting provincial boundaries requires a change to the constitution: the process is open to manipulation for political gain, and the African National Congress’s (ANC’s) record in such matters is not encouraging.

The fact is that, however logical it may be for a split municipality to fall under one province rather than another, it is the people on the ground who will have to cope with the practicalities of the change. While they will not be shifted physically, their lives will certainly be affected, even damaged. And if they do not support the change, it amounts to a virtual forced removal. Do we really want to trudge down that road again, even in a virtual sense?

The number of violent protests that have taken place in affected municipalities is a pretty clear indication that the communities concerned are convinced that the change to their lives will be for the worse. Mostly, they are right.

Khutsong, the township that erupted in flames last week as residents made clear their preference for Gauteng over North West, is far closer to Johannesburg than to Potchefstroom, its proposed new administrative centre. As patchy as it may be, services delivery is significantly better in Gauteng than North West, and the residents of both provinces know it.

Similarly, burgers of Matatiele, on the border between Eastern Cape and KwaZulu-Natal, have strong historical and economic ties with Pietermaritzburg, but face the prospect of falling under the shaky administrative hand of Bisho. Which is more likely to build houses, or maintain the local school? In some instances, the decision could literally be a life or death one — AIDS patients who are receiving free antiretroviral treatment from one province are not guaranteed that this will continue when they are obliged to depend on another’s organisational ability, or lack of it.

Mufamadi’s role in the brewing crisis deserves further scrutiny. The decision to scrap cross-border municipalities was taken in 2001. There has been no satisfactory explanation why passing the legislation to do so was left till a matter of months before local government elections have to take place.

Was this mere government inefficiency or a deliberate strategy to ensure that Parliament and the provinces have little choice but to rush it through to avoid missing the election deadline? One of the proposed boundary changes will result in more than 400000 voters who currently fall under North West, an ANC stronghold, being transferred to Northern Cape, where the balance of political power is far closer.

As long as government forges ahead with such changes against the wishes of affected communities, the suspicion will remain that gerrymandering is at least a secondary motivating force.

From: http://www.businessday.co.za/articles/opinion.aspx?ID=BD4A114821