Take City Ombudsman to the people, councillors call

31 January 2017

 

The Office of City of Johannesburg Ombudsman, Advocate Sduduzo Gumede, must be more independent, beefed up with more staff and moved to a township or nearer people who need his services the most.

 

This call was made by Democratic Alliance (DA) and Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) councillors during a monthly council meeting at the Metro Centre in Braamfontein on Thursday January 26.

Commenting on the first 2016-2017 quarterly report on the performance the Office of the Ombudsman, Chair of Chairs of Council, Cllr Alex Christians, remarked that as much as the office was doing “a sterling job so far”, a lot still needed to be done to show its independence.

Cllr Christians said to have more credibility, the Office of the Ombudsman needed to move from the “ivory towers of Houghton”, from which it currently operates, and taken to an area “closer to the people”.

Cllr Christians was supported by EFF’s Cllr J Mosehla, who said the Ombudman’s office was short-staffed and needed to be among the people, “where he belongs”.

African National Congress (ANC) councillor Parks Tau said the work of the Ombudsman should be commended, saying his office was critical to the City’s operations. Cllr Tau said, however, that the by-laws governing the work of the Ombudsman should be amended and his office be solution-orientated than be regarded as a problem.

In the first quarter of 2016-2017, between 1 July 2016 and 31 September 2016, the Office of the Ombudsman received a total of 88 new cases, equating to a monthly average of 29 new complaints. The report states that a total of 1 231 complaints were lodged with the Office of the Ombudsman in the first year of its establishment. Of these, 491 were resolved, mainly through settlements.

This rate, according to the report, should be seen in the context of “a new office with [only] two people handling all complaints brought by residents”.

According to the United Kingdom Local Government Ombudsman website, a reasonable allocation of cases per investigator should be about 25 a month.

The council report states that if this could be used as a yardstick, the City of Johannesburg’s Office of the Ombudsman’s caseload, which translated into 615 per investigator per year or (around 51 per month), should be seen as “excessive”.

The report notes, however, the matter is being addressed by the City’s Office Capacitation Strategy currently being implemented.