By Glenn Hollands

ROLLING protests and violent unrest are increasingly becoming a feature of South African civil life. In the days of the crumbling apartheid state, municipal facilities associated with a racist regime were the day-to-day targets for activists and angry communities. Accessible and associated with an indolent and uncaring bureaucracy, the rent offices, Black Local Authority administrations and the beer halls were regularly stoned and burnt to the ground in what became an almost mundane weekly drama between the oppressed and their unelected rulers.

For many township residents, the era has seemingly returned and there is a certain familiarity to the atmosphere of spilling sewerage overlaid by teargas and the crackle of police rubber bullets.

The South African Human Rights Commission has been stirred to action and on 25 July voiced its concern at the level of “violence, the destruction of property and the threat to human life”, noting that these “cannot be justified, irrespective of the circumstances”. 

The Commission has become aware of the increasingly blunt police response to such actions and notes: “The measures taken by the security agencies must also conform to the principle of legality and be proportional in the circumstances.” While these comments are commendably balanced, the HRC should not be overly surprised by the lack of civility within the municipal protests.

The recent civil service strike, the violent protests by security workers and the intermittent flexing of muscle by the taxi industry all demonstrated an unhealthy disregard for Constitutional principles of civility and non-violence when basic livelihood issues are at stake.

What has clearly shaken the ruling party is the fact that high-profile municipal politicians are now being quite uncompromisingly targeted.  Ditsobotla Municipality mayor Itumeleng Lethoko was placed under police guard to protect her from angry residents and many other local luminaries have been chased from their homes. 

The murder of senior ANC councillor Ntai Mokoena who was the chief whip in Deneysville in the Free State rocked the nation and had the ANC strongly denying that it was related to service grievances.  Deputy mayor, Thandi Mtsweni of the Govan Mbeki Municipality, who was assassinated outside her home in Mpumalanga, is rumoured to have been investigating suspected housing irregularities.

These may not be cases of disgruntled citizens lashing out at leadership but they do suggest that there are strong fault lines within the corridors of municipal politics.

But senior politicians who seem bent on bringing the municipal disturbances to heel through political bullying or wielding the authority of the Tripartite Alliance may be in for a steep learning curve.

“(Mosiuoa) Lekota has succeeded only in further poisoning the atmosphere. After spending most of the week working with party structures wearing his hat as ANC national chairperson, he changed his headgear at the weekend. He called a ‘government imbizo’ for last Sunday in Khutsong, where he became defence minister.” – Journalist Rapule Tabane describing Defence Minister Mosiuoa Lekota’s efforts to quell Khutsong protests

Lekota and Justice Minister Brigitte Mabandla were later to leave the area under heavily armed police protection. But politicians persist in trying to undermine the legitimacy of service protests and by mid-July 2007 it was the turn of Housing Minister Lindiwe Sisulu to scold the protestors for being manipulated by criminal elements and to assure her radio audience that corruption in local government was over-blown and could thus not be a real cause for grievances.

The fact that service grievances are being politically manipulated is hardly up for debate. The point, however, is that under these political dynamics lie real issues of failed local governance and disregard for legitimate community concerns. The Anti-North West Committee did not invent the demarcation debate around the incorporation of Khutsong and the broader Merafong Municipality into the North West Province.

In fact, it was Minister of Provincial and Local Government Sydney Mufamadi who overruled the recommendations of the Municipal Demarcation Board (MDB) in taking Merafong out of Gauteng. A fundamental principle of the democratic local government system, namely that citizens are consulted if their municipal boundaries are to change, appears to have been disregarded – not just in Merafong but also in Matatiele in the Eastern Cape and Moutse.

Section 21 (4) and (5) of the Municipal Demarcation Act (Act 27 of 1998) protects the rights of affected citizens to be consulted on new boundaries or boundary changes. Section 24 sets out the objectives of demarcation and makes it clear that the MDB is responsible for the creation of settlements that work in terms of service delivery and can be democratically governed. An area must have boundaries that enable it to function in an integrated and sustainable manner.

Matters to be considered include existing and expected patterns of human settlement and migration, the possibilities of employment, dominant commuting and transport patterns, the use of amenities and infrastructure and commercial and industrial links. Furthermore demarcation should allow that an area has the prospects of being governed with the administrative competence and resources it requires.

These are precisely the issues raised by the people resisting incorporation into the North West and on the face of it, their concerns are not just relevant, but well founded.

In disregarding the recommendations of the MDB the ministry and senior politicians owe not just the people of Merafong an answer about how they have interpreted these criteria, they should also explain to the nation how the democratic provisions of the Municipal Demarcation Act and other local government legislation are going to be interpreted in the future.

Glenn Hollands is a partner in Mbumba Development Services in East London.

The Local Government Transformer August/September 2007