Pretoria - The refurbishment of the mayoral offices at the Pretoria City Hall has come at a higher cost than originally anticipated, the City of Tshwane has said.
However, mayoral spokesman Blessing Manale said they were determined to see the project through, so much so that plans were already afoot for the inauguration of the next mayor of the city to be held there.
The refurbished City Hall will be the base of the mayoral office and support staff after the upcoming municipal elections.
The city has already spent R3 million - R7m more than originally budgeted. But a legal threat is looming over the project, while a new contractor is yet to be appointment. This will push the costs even higher. The original completion date has passed by almost a year.
However, Manale said budget adjustments were made within the financial year, and the additional cost did not negatively affect municipal coffers.
And legal threats and escalating costs would not derail the project.
“Whether it is incumbent Kgosientso Ramokgopa or a newcomer, the executive mayor will be inaugurated at the City Hall,” Manale declared.
The current Centurion offices of the mayor were a service centre for the old Verwoerdburg Municipality, which became part of the City of Tshwane in the new dispensation.
They accommodate the mayor and protocol staff and will in future be remodelled into a service delivery war room and central operations of customer care.
The City Hall will also accommodate executive heads of media and public affairs, protocol and ceremonial, intergovernmental and international relations as well as a mayoral private team, special interest groups and performance monitoring and evaluation personnel.
Manale said the refurbishment of the City Hall to accommodate the mayoral office had been massively delayed, but would resume in a matter of weeks.
The project has previously been heavily criticised after it emerged that the city spent R22m on revamping four levels of Isivuno House in the city centre for the mayor. He, however, never took occupation of the offices and moved to Centurion instead.
The city has appointed a new project manager and will have a contractor in place to start work by April 1. The joint venture that started the refurbishment was fired following a contractual dispute, which Manale would not disclose.
“We anticipated a legal challenge to emanate from the previous contractor, but this will not further delay the project.
“We are determined to start in April and the mayor has set that date. The new project manager understands the functioning of local government and will be able to oversee the work smoothly. We know a lot still has to be done within the main hall itself,” he said.
The termination of the contract with the joint venture makes it impossible to establish what has been done and what was outstanding. It was also impossible at this stage to ascertain budgetary requirements.
The city is also building the state-of-the-art municipal head offices, Tshwane House, at the site of the old Munitoria. Questions have been raised regarding the logic of spending money on the City Hall when the mayor would have an office at Tshwane House.
Manale said Tshwane House would be the administration base to enable the mayor to conduct council business and engage the speaker and chief whip, among others.
City Hall, meanwhile, will be the seat of the municipal executive.
“The City Hall is more than just office space; it will become a place for civic engagements.”
The Pretoria City Hall was built in 1931 and inaugurated in 1935. It is located in Paul Kruger Street south of Church Square and across the Transvaal Museum.
Pretorius Square lies is in front of the building, including fountains and maintained gardens.
Three statues of significant figures decorate the park: Marthinus Wessel Pretorius, Andries Pretorius and Chief Tshwane.
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