SEVERAL opposition parties have lambasted the City of Cape Town for under-spending its budget in what they called critical areas.
Mayor Dan Plato tabled the Adjustments Budget during the first council meeting for 2021 held on Thursday.
The capital budget has been adjusted from R8.6 billion to R7.3bn while the operating budget was adjusted from R44.9bn to R44.3bn. The parties noted that some directorates including water and sanitation, transport, and human settlements had underpsent on their budgets
“This boils down to roll-overs year after year. This is an insult to the citizens of Cape Town. Services delayed is services denied,” said the ANC’s Charlotte Heyns.
The party noted that the water and sanitation department had cut its budget by R525 million despite the need to spend on infrastructure maintenance and provide services to poor areas.
The EFF’s Faranaaz Gaffoor noted with concern the failure to spend R77.8m in skills development.
“Every year there’s under expenditure by the same directorates and there’s different excuses. Now the Covid-19 pandemic is used as the main reason in addition to tender delays and community resistance. Our communities need these services.”
The Freedom Front Plus also rejected the budget, noting that the impact of Covid-19 would still be felt by ratepayers for years to come.
“Covid-19 cannot be used as an excuse for under-expenditure and bad administration,” said Erika Botha-Rossouw.
Plato said some of the funds had to be redirected towards the community services directorate to expand the number of grave sites available at City graveyards across the metro and improve functionality at crematoriums.
An amount of R2.2bn was allocated to the upgrade of the Potsdam wastewater treatment plant.
It is estimated that work on the plant would be completed in 2025.
Deputy mayor and mayoral committee member for Finance, Ian Nielson said an amount of R2.1bn was used from prior year’s surpluses to boost the budget. “Given the inability of the citizens to cope with high rates and tariff increases.”
“Those savings will get us through this financial year although this is not sustainable in the long term,” he said.
Nielson said despite the financial impact the pandemic had on the citizens, “they had been loyal” to the City and paid their bills at better rates than anticipated.
For the period of July to December the payment ratio was 101.7% as many citizens caught up with their arrears.
“Billing for rates, water and electricity were close to projections for the last half of the year but billings for sanitation and refuse were down around 5%.”
He said the efforts to drive savings were successful and savings of R689m were achieved.
The biggest contributor was in salaries and wages with R431m savings.
Revenue was R392m below projections, he added.
Cope’s Farouk Cassim said more revenue could have been achieved.
“Did the City negotiate rental reductions with their landlords? Why are we not told about reductions in travel expenses by members? Achieving expenditure reductions should go hand in glove with strategic investments in big infrastructure. We should support investment in solar energy and extend the installation of fibre networks to support online work and study.
Cassim noted that the transport department underspent by R322m, and called this an “indictment” on the City.
“Both foresight and acumen have been lacking. Cope will not support the budget,” he added.