DA Calls for Scrapping of CDW Programme

In the Gauteng Provincial Legislature during this week’s budget debate on local government and housing, I called for the Community Development Worker programme (CDW) to be scrapped in its entirety and the R86 million spent on this programme to be allocated to more important local government priorities.

The Department of Local Government and Housing was given R4.568 billion for the 2011/12 financial year to address housing and local government. It is shocking  that local government has only been allocated 5,5% of the department’s budget or 0,37% (R208 million) of Gauteng’s overall budget. I question the province’s commitment to rectifying what is wrong with local government. It stands to reason that when a limited budget has been allocated to a programme, it should be very skillfully prioritised in order to ensure that it is used to maximum effect.

When the Local Governance budget is evaluated it becomes clear that the Gauteng Department of Local Government and Housing’s priorities are as follows.

1. Community development workers (42%);
2. Municipal finance (26%)
3. Capacity and development (12%)
4. Municipal administration (6%)

Firstly the problem within this programme is with the significant expenditure on community development workers. When one analyses the priorities set out by the Local Government Turnaround Strategy there is no real function for community development workers. The strategy focuses on improved financial management, service delivery, capacity building, efficient planning and accountability.

Secondly, a study undertaken on behalf of the department by the Community Agency for Social Enquiry (CASE) last year found that community
development workers had very little impact in Gauteng. Only 12% of Gauteng’s residents were aware of CDW’s in their areas and only 43% of these respondents knew what a CDW does. This means only 5% of the total sample knew what a CDW does. In addition less than 3% of those surveyed ever received assistance from a CDW. Taking into consideration that there was a CDW in almost every municipal ward in Gauteng during the period under review, this impact is extremely low.

Lastly, CDW’s are accountable to provincial government while dealing with local government and national government issues. Although CDW’s have assisted a very small percentage of residents to gain access to basic services, the bulk of their time is used to assist with obtaining grants, important documents like ID’s, accessing skills training opportunities and receiving assistance with community development projects.

CDW’s can merely report problems to municipalities but do not have the backing or capacity to drive those complaints to a conclusion. CDW’s are thus accountable to a sphere of government it does not represent while addressing issues from residents in a sphere where they have no influence.

The DA would like to see the CDW programme scrapped in its entirety and the R 86 million spent on this programme rather allocated to more important priorities within the local governance sub-programme. In order to solve the problems faced by municipalities in Gauteng three things must happen:

1. Municipal finance management must be improved considerably including addressing the issue of financial sustainability as identified as a risk by the Auditor General in his latest report on municipal finances in Gauteng.
2. Human resource capacity must be restored by appointing suitably qualified and fit for purpose career officials in key management positions in municipalities.
3. Mayors must be left to be mayors and held accountable for their decisions and not for those decisions prescribed to them
   by an outside political body.