The DA in eThekwini Municipality has raised concerns about the City’s decision to spend R200 000 to host a function where it will announce which NGOs will be getting funding from the City.
A report on the matter revealed that the City will spend close to R5 million funding different NGOs operating in the City.
An additional R200 000 will be sent aside to host an event where the NGOs that are going to receive funding will be unveiled.
The report on the matter said the eThekwini Municipality embarked on a process of tackling the socio-economic challenges at ward level with Non-Profit Organisations with a view to allow for the provision of Grant-In-Aid to organisations pursuing programmatic goals aligned with the government objectives.
It called for “authority be granted to the head: Community Participation and Action Support to incur expenditure in the amount of R5 582 880 for the implementation of Grant-in-Aid to 108 beneficiaries.
“That approval be granted to host the distribution event to the beneficiaries of the Grant-In-Aid and that an amount of R208 000 be allocated towards the logistics for hosting the said event,” it said.
DA councillor Thabani Mthethwa raised concerns about the spending on the hosting of the event; “I do not understand why we have to spend that amount of money to host the event, what can’t we call the NGO to the office to come and sign (for the funding).”
He called on the City to instead use the money to fund more organisations and host the event at one of its halls to cut costs.
But ANC councillor Nkosenhle Madlala said this event was important for the purpose of transparency, “If we are spending such a large amount of money of the council, we should be transparent about it. The public should be able to see that it is not the councillor’s wife or girlfriend that received the funding.”
The Mercury