Durban - The Msunduzi Municipality’s “pro poor” budget was met with mixed reactions this week.
While the DA has refused to support the 2015/16 budget, the IFP’s Dolo Zondi said the party welcomed it, as it was “sensitive to the needs of the poorer communities”.
Mayor Chris Ndlela presented the city’s R4.165 billion budget to full council on Wednesday, saying that the primary consideration in its preparation was “the plight of the poorest of the poor”.
Ndlela said he was pleased with the budget. He explained that he had come into office in 2010, a time when the municipality was unable to deliver basic services to its residents, but with hard work and determination, his administration had pulled the municipality back from the brink of bankruptcy.
He said the tariff adjustments were in line with national norms and the prescribed rates of the electricity regulator, Nersa, and Umgeni Water.
Increases include:
* Sanitation, refuse, hall hire and other services: 5.8 percent;
* Rates: 6 percent;
* Electricity: 12.2 percent
* Water: 8.2 percent
Ndlela said the city had opted not to add a municipal mark-up to the increases from Eskom and Umgeni Water, in an effort to “mitigate the negative impact”.
He announced that a capital replacement reserve had been created to gradually replace ageing infrastructure.
The DA refused to support the budget, indicating the city’s allocation for repairs and maintenance had decreased by R36 million and was below the national norm.
The DA’s Dave Ryder said that while the party approved of some aspects of the budget, it could not support it because of the poor state of the municipality’s debtors book; the number of properties on which no rates were being paid and the reduction in the repairs and maintenance budget.
Msunduzi Speaker Babu Baijoo said the budget showed that huge strides were being made.
Daily News