Gauteng's worst municipalities

The worst-performing local municipalities in Gauteng have been exposed - they are Merafong City, Westonaria and Randfontein, all on the West Rand.

This is according to the "Liveability Monitor" report, released by trade union Solidarity yesterday.

The report measured the performances of Gauteng municipalities based on factors such as service delivery, sanitation, education and financial standing.

The three West Rand district municipalities scored 55%, 50% and 55% in that order.

The report found that in Westonaria, only 30.8% of households had piped water and that there was only one police station to service a population of more than 130000.

According to the report, Merafong City had some of the most shocking educational statistics.

Of the municipality's residents aged over 21, only 18.1% have passed matric and only 1.3% have a university degree.

Merafong City council incurred irregular and unauthorised expenditure of R13-million, mostly because of a lack of accounting supervision by political leaders.

In Randfontein, 41.4% of the residents earn between R1 and R38200 a year and 12.3% of households have no income at all.

Eugene Brink, the project's senior researcher, said one reason for the poor performance of these municipalities was the exodus of local talent to bigger municipalities with "bigger budgets".

Johannesburg and Tshwane scored fairly well in the report, each scoring 70%.

"But this is not to say they are perfect," said Brink.

Tshwane has the second-lowest percentage of residents with a flush toilet in their home - 71.3%. This is 6.84% below the provincial average and better only than Westonaria (64.5%).

The Johannesburg metro recorded material losses of more than R800-million in the 2011-12 financial year.

Only 10% of Johannesburg residents have had a tertiary education and more than half of them have not completed matric.

The Johannesburg metro has 44 police stations, meaning that each station caters for an average of 88636 people.

"The purpose of this monitor is to find out what the shortcomings of the municipalities are," said Solidarity spokesman Johan Kruger.

Solidarity plans to compile similar reports on other provinces, starting with Limpopo. The Limpopo report is scheduled for release in October.

"There is an increasing feeling among the public that you have to take action on your own to be able to hold your local government to account," said Kruger.

"We want to use this as a launching pad for further action to engage with civil society."