Development coming to Roodepoort, IDP meeting told
17-04-2015
The alleged slow pace of service delivery and failure by political leaders to fulfil their promises, as well as unemployment and crime, were singled out at a Region C meeting to review the City of Joburg’s 2015-2016 Integrated Development Plan (IDP) on Thursday night as some of the major challenges facing communities.
The public participation gathering was held at the Roodepoort Athletics Club in Ruimsig.
One of the residents, Dan Moletsane, demanded that the City takes urgent steps to upgrade RDP houses and electrify shacks in his area.
“We are tired of empty promises and want action,” Moletsane said.
Another resident said the community was faced with high unemployment and crime.
Other concerns raised at the meeting included the lack of a public hospital in the area, which resulted in residents having to walk long distances to access public healthcare.
The gathering was part of a series of regional cluster meetings or “community conversations” at which residents are expected to give inputs on the draft IDP.
Included in the documents are the City’s proposals on tariffs for essential services including water, electricity and refuse removal, as well as draft property rates and taxes for the 2015-2016 financial year.
The IDP is a multi-year strategic plan that contains the City’s strategies and implementation plans required to achieve its vision.
The ongoing public participation process will culminate in a stakeholder meeting on Saturday April 25 when submissions and proposals from the various cluster meetings will be communicated, discussed and, where applicable, incorporated into the final IDP document.
Sipho Madi, Director: Group Strategy Policy Relations and Coordination in Region C, encouraged residents to make inputs as South Africa was a democratic country “where every citizen is a shareholder”.
He said the IDP must reflect the municipality’s vision for long-term development with specific emphasis on the City’s most critical development and internal transformation needs.
“A city without its people is not a city,” Madi said.
He said the City was going to accelerate its programmes and stick to what “we have promised”.
“We are going to roll out the Wi-Fi system and electrify informal settlements."
He said the City was committed to good governance, which included driving a caring responsive, efficient and progressive service delivery agenda.
He said the City was looking forward to improving social, health and safety conditions with the main focus on poverty and deprivation.
He said the City was committed to inclusive economic growth to address inequality. It would also start food programmes to eliminate hunger and poverty, he added.
Madi said residents would this year see the completion of the rollout of the broadband network.
“We intend to roll out 1 000 Wi-Fi hotspots throughout the city before the end of the mayoral term,” he said.
On socioeconomic development, he said 24.7% of residents were still living below the poverty line. He said, however, that the number of people living below the poverty line had decreased by 16.25% in the past 10 years.