Sanibonani, Good day, Molweni!
I stand before you today with immense gratitude and a deep sense of responsibility, as I take the oath of loyalty to Constitution and all other law.
This honor you have bestowed on me is not one I take lightly. It is a responsibility I humbly accept, knowing very well the expectation that comes with the job. Thus, I pledge not to fail the residents of this beautiful City.
Honourable Speaker, please, allow me to thank my predecessor, Former Mayor Mxolisi Kaunda who had been in this position since 2019 and I want to wish him well as he assumes his new responsibilities. My predecessors laid a solid foundation. We will continue working closely with community leaders, business and all our stakeholders to create solutions that reflect our collective aspirations.
Our city has a vibrant and dynamic community, rich in diversity and full of potential. It is a place where different cultures, ideas and dreams come together like bright rainbow colours to create a thriving environment. Working as a collective, I commit to nurture this diversity and harness our collective strengths to build a more inclusive future, that no one must feel left out.
Working collectively, we will review areas that have not performed well and implement new approaches, in the process enhance transparency and improve accountability, to ensure effective and efficient service delivery. To that end, we will also ensure that those entrusted with the responsibilities are responsive and more accountable.
Our priorities are clear. To name but a few, we will focus on:
Improving water and sanitation infrastructure as well as ensuring uninterrupted water supply;
A safe and clean city;
Inner-city rejuvenation;
Strengthening good governance and fighting corruption;
Attracting investment and promoting an inclusive economy that creates jobs.
We want to appeal to the employees of the municipality to recommit themselves to serve the public with integrity, honour, and humility in line with the Batho Pele Principle. We must state unequivocally that we will not tolerate people who do not want to work and those who pursue their self-interests at the expense of the people of eThekwini. We will monitor performance of senior management to ensure that it is aligned to the objectives and key performance indicators that underpin our IDP.
Early this month, I received reports that some parts of Hillcrest & Clermont Extension, in the Pinetown area were without water for an extended period. I found it utterly unacceptable. It degrades the quality of life of those affected and undermines their basic human right. I shall write to the City Manager to ask for a detailed report as why the residents of Clermont and Hillcrest were without water. Whether such could have been prevented or at least mitigated. Whether there was negligence on the part of our officials. And the proposed course of action. I shall be following up on other areas that have been without water for a considerable period, and I will treat this as urgent.
In our effort to promote clean and accountable administration, we commit to continue to work with all institutions that are charged with a responsibility of enforcing good governance such as the Auditor-General, Treasury and the Department of Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs (COGTA).
Honourable Speaker, the Constitution enjoins all spheres of government and organs of state to “cooperate with one another in mutual trust and good faith by assisting and supporting one another.” S41(1)(h). Consistent with that there have been several initiatives aimed at supporting and assisting the municipality.
Honourable Speaker, we welcome the support that we are currently receiving from the provincial and national government through Section 154. We want to assure you that we will cooperate with all support teams to ensure that the city improves in all identified areas of intervention.
It is important to state that the city has been supported on an ongoing basis in the following areas:
City Support Programme by National Treasury which helped the city in the development of the water and sanitation turnaround strategy
Water and sanitation team turnaround strategy implementation team.
Water and sanitation support for operations by the Department of Water and Sanitation
Umngeni/Uthukela Water on maintenance and operation of ten Wastewater Treatment Works
National Department of COGTA on various service delivery support Wastewater Treatment Works
The Presidential Working Group which provides support on seven workstreams which include, among others, disaster management and governance
KZN COGTA support on issues of service delivery, consequence management and grants expenditure
National Treasury support on collection of government debt
Ongoing oversight on financial management in line with the MFMA
Next week, we will be engaging with all support teams with an intention of strengthening relations and ensuring that our work is aligned to adequately respond to the service delivery needs.
Fellow residents, we are acutely aware that building a functional and sustainable city requires a collective effort. In this regard, we want to commit to bolstering our working relations with the business sector to build a vibrant and resilient economy.
We must continue to facilitate the ease of doing business in eThekwini by creating efficient systems that improve turnaround time and remove the red tape – making it easier for investors to do business in the city.
Ladies and gentlemen, we are going to continue to actively participate in multilateral fora to ensure that our city plays a meaningful role and occupies its rightful place among the cities of the world.
We must strengthen our collaborative efforts on issues of climate change by building an environmentally sustainable and resilient city. This is crucial considering that we are a coastal city that is prone to catastrophic weather events.
The frequency of flood disasters in the city calls on us to review our strategies to adapt and mitigate the impact of climate change. It is critical that we have a functioning and effective early warning system that can help us to prevent the loss of life.
Equally, our stakeholders in the built environment must collaborate with us to ensure that we build better and smarter. On our part as a city, we are going to insist that people desist from building in flood prone areas as we continue to avail suitable land for human settlement.
Ladies and Gentlemen, we wish to emphasize that we will double our effort to create a safe and clean environment for the people of eThekwini. We are determined to improve collaboration with all law enforcement agencies including the South African Police Services to curb crime.
We must also endeavour to adequately resource our Metro Police so that their presence is felt throughout the city. Over and above increasing the number of Metro Police Personnel, we must invest in smart policing, using technology such as CCTV cameras to prevent crime.
We want to remind our residents that fighting crime is a collective responsibility. Therefore, we pledge to collaborate with all legitimate community crime fighting structures within the city.
Honourable Speaker, we will need the same collaborative effort to get our city clean so that we can attract investment and grow our tourism. We urge residents and businesses to play their role by disposing of waste in designated areas.
In the next few days, we will be meeting with all service delivery units to streamline our plans to clean the city, rehabilitate our roads, fix streetlights, maintain our sport facilities and parks, build houses, and deal with water and sewer leakages. From these engagements, we will be able to develop new approaches to accelerate service delivery.
At the same time, we will be engaging Amakhosi, political parties, business community, organised labour, civil society, religious sector, and academia to solicit their input on how we can take the city forward.
I assure you of my total commitment to collaborate with all political parties and stakeholders to make this city work for its residents. Once again, I extend my sincere thanks to the ANC, the leadership of this beautiful City and the staff in my office. I wish to extend my appreciation to my wife and children for support.
Ladies and Gentlemen, working together we can do more to grow this city and ensure that we leave no one behind. We must respond to the call made by His Excellency, President Cyril Ramaphosa that, and I quote: “As leaders, as political parties we are called upon to work in partnership towards a growing economy, better jobs, safer communities and a government that works for its people.”
I thank you.
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