Don’t forget our mandate, Mayor Tau reminds MoEs

04-2015

 

Much as it was important to focus on and apply generally accepted business principles in their push to meet their objectives, the City of Johannesburg’s business units or municipal-owned entities (MoEs) were equally expected to carry out the transformation agenda of the governing party – the African National Congress. 
 

Opening the 14th annual general meeting of the City’s business units at the Wanderers Cricket Stadium on Tuesday, Johannesburg Executive Mayor Cllr Parks Tau reminded the entities that the council was elected on a specific mandate and that this ought to manifest itself in the conduct of these units.
 

The Executive Mayor was addressing accounting officers of Johannesburg City Power, Johannesburg Social Housing Company, Johannesburg Theatre, Johannesburg Property Company, Johannesburg City Parks & Zoo, Johannesburg Development Agency, Johannesburg Water, Johannesburg Roads Agency, Metropolitan Bus Service, Johannesburg Metropolitan Police Department, Johannesburg Fresh Produce Market and Pikitup.
 

The political mandate must come through a “fundamental social transformation effort”, Mayor Tau said. 

He defined the work of the City from what he called a “compartmentalisation perspective”. He said the compartments he was referring to were:

The enterprise unit: This refers to a Johannesburg that conducts its affairs well and applies generally accepted business principles while carrying out its political mandate;
 

 Service delivery: This requires organisational competency to carry out the work required of a municipality. The Mayor said the City was on track with its service delivery programmes, including its commitment to spend R100 billion over a 10-year period on infrastructure development;

 The political mandate: It is important that the City does not lose focus of how it is constituted and the promises that have been made. The primary agenda of the governing party, and by extension the City, he said, was to transform the old order; and

 The civic ceremonial role.

The Mayor also spoke about what he called the “political economy of space", an aspect that fell within the political mandate.

He said it was this “political economy of space” that influenced people’s lifestyles and their proximity to education. 

He added that it was on the basis of the skewed structural architecture of the past that the City was accelerating the programme of the Corridors of Freedom, an initiative that seeks to create mixed use residential areas at a number of identified locations.

He said extensive work at redesigning the outlook of the areas had already started at three spatial nodes. These were Empire Path (Empire Road through Auckland Park, Westbury/Coronation); Louis Botha through Alexandra/Marlboro; and Turffontein/Rosettenville.

The Mayor also emphasised the critical role to be played by the Jozi@Work Programme, the City’s unique empowerment and job creation vehicle.

He said he wanted to see all the entities creating work packages for cooperatives and community-based companies registered under the programme.

“We want the residents of Johannesburg to be co-delivery agents of municipal services,” he said.