Residents urge Ramaphosa to bring services to the people
GA MOTODI
President Cyril Ramaphosa led the 8th District Development Model (DDM) Presidential Imbizo and interacted with communities in Sekhukhune District Municipality.
Themed ‘Leave No One Behind’, the Imbizo was held at the Motodi Sports Complex in Ga-Motodi Village in the Fetakgomo Tubatse Local Municipality.
The President began with an inspection site visit to the R37 Driekop-Steelpoort Interchange Road Project, followed by the community engagement.
During his visit, Ramaphosa engaged directly with the communities and stakeholders in Sekhukhune, addressing their concerns and seeking solutions to unblock challenges hindering integrated service delivery.
Residents raised challenges on roads, electricity, jobs, and access to water as well as many more challenges.
Ramaphosa said the DDM is an integrated planning model for cooperative governance that seeks to ensure an integrated, district-based service delivery approach aimed at fast-tracking service delivery.
He said he had heard and accepted all the challenges faced by the communities.
He promised these problems would be attended to promptly, and acknowledge that South Africa was a water-scarce country.
“Government has set aside billions of rands to address the chronic water shortages in Sekhukhune and elsewhere in the country. We are, however, saddened by the poor planning and the lack of capacity in the municipal infrastructure development. “We are further saddened by the escalating theft of money meant to improve the lives of our people by those who are supposed to keep it. We are also not happy with municipalities that return money to the National Treasury at the end of the financial year for failing to spend it.”
He said the imbizo is platform for face-to-face engagement between citizens and senior government leaders.
“It holds the administration to account and allows government to consult and brief communities on development and service delivery in the relevant area.”
The engagement is also aimed at fostering collaboration between government, residents, business, community-based organisations and traditional leadership in transforming all districts in South Africa.
With the participation of leadership from the National, Provincial, and Local spheres of government, the President’s visit facilitated meaningful community engagement, ensuring that government programmes and initiatives are tailored to meet the needs and priorities of residents.
Leading up to the dialogue with the community at the DDM Presidential Imbizo, government leaders from all three spheres have interacted with key stakeholders and paid visits to service delivery projects within the four local municipalities in the Sekhukhune District Municipality.
