The Local Government Passion-Governance Interface

Author: de Wit Coetsee

Director: De Wit Coetsee Consulting

Email: [email protected]

LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/de-wit-coetsee-a67a4b

The Local Government Passion-Governance Interface

Successful local government service delivery is not driven by good governance alone, but also by passion, for the people and their cause – this is the passion-governance interface.

I spent a total of 30 years in the three tiers of the South African government: national, provincial, and local. Some of this time I was involved in leading a departmental ICT component and rendering an ICT support service, whilst most of this time was spent developing transversal governance systems for the use of information technology in service delivery[1]. I had the privilege of not only developing ICT governance systems, but also training government officials (at various levels) in operationalising it. I also conducted compliance assessments at national and provincial government level. I gained a good understanding of the effectiveness of the passion-governance interface from the evidence of the compliance assessments at my disposal I could deduce where there was political and administrative will (passion) to drive good service delivery. This was derived from the ICT Strategic Plans submitted. One could clearly deduct which of these were informed by the business ecosystem that involved cooperation between the head of ICT and the business, and which were compliance documents, created to satisfy measurement criteria. In the former the passion to improve service delivery was evident.

With these assessment results at my disposal, the question that I asked myself was: “What do we, as governance practitioners, miss if bad service can be rendered in the face of regulated contextual good governance mechanisms?[2]” How can we live in this euphoria of establishing brilliant governance frameworks to inform governance systems and yet its application generally fails in realising good service delivery at the hands of human actors? Why does it result in good service delivery only in certain institutions? Can the political-administrative-citizen interface in failing institutions be inspired to generate passion directed by good governance mechanisms? I doubt it. In fact, for example, governance lays the foundation for institutional ethics, but ethical behaviour is dependent on personal will. As good governance systems exist, the decaying state of local government service delivery can be attributed to human actions. Compassion for the people and passion for their cause is supposed to drive human action, not power and self-gain.

After I left local government, I realised what one of the core elements of service delivery successes and failures is. My simplistic conclusion is that success stories are driven by human actors that have vision and passion for the people and their cause and are implemented in well-defined and managed governance ecosystems.

In this opinion piece, I will provide insights into what I will term the local government passion-governance interface.

A better life for all theme

This theme, and its strategic intent, pulls through from the United Nations Agenda 2030[3] to the African Union Agenda 2063[4], and the South African Constitution[5], into the National Development Plan[6], the Medium-Term Strategic Framework[7] and reflects in the strategic and integrated development plans of all national[8], provincial[9], and local government institutions[10]. It is also woven into the rhetoric of political party manifestos.

With all this as strategic intent, it is a wonderous affair that since independence in 1996, right through the intention of the millennium development goals[11], the intention of the sustainable development goals[12], and all the related cascaded strategic intent of the three spheres of the South African government the promise of a better life for all and its related service delivery promises were generally not realised. It can only be expected that this is due to human failure, with the passion for the political and personal agendas possibly being greater than the passion for the cause of the people; whom local government is supposed to serve.

The ruling party created a South African government system[13][14] that is designed in such a way that it is positioned to best serve its citizens[15]. The following diagram shows a simplistic functional view of the government system and the related arrangements to realise a better life for all through all three layers of the South African government.

DIAGRAM 1: GOVERNMENT SYSTEM

By author

This diagram shows that the core focus of the whole government system is to realise the dream of a better life for all focused on the needs of the people of South Africa. This is achieved through a suitable service focused on citizen needs and service requirements. ?Government services are built on a foundation of a services ecosystem undergirded by infrastructure and geospatial factors. The strategy to render related service is developed and administered by human actors, which utilise people, information, technology, and public finances. This is determined and delivered according to an accountable governance system. This government and governance system allow for public participation[16] in the development of strategy (to address their requirements) and monitor its implementation to ensure that their needs are met[17].

Taking the above into consideration, it can be surmised that the government system’s design is strategically correct and optimised for rendering services that could achieve a better life for all. It is however also necessary to depict the complicated context in which this model operates, as per the following diagram:

DIAGRAM 2: GOVERNMENT AND CITIZEN SERVICE DELIVERY ECOSYSTEM

By author

This diagram shows the complexity of local government service delivery. It requires coordinated cooperation of the citizen, political structures, and municipal administration. It involves the establishment of a conducive political and administration interface to address human needs in a disparate social, community and spatial context. This includes the use of, and long-term sustainability of the land, natural resources, and service-related infrastructure. When coordinated to create value, these collaborate to establish a sustainable human and other resource ecosystem. In this ecosystem which citizens and businesses can progressively thrive. In such a healthy ecosystem, mutual trust is developed. This mutual trust is the combined responsibility of a cooperative political-administration-citizen interface. ?In the functioning of the political-administration-citizen interface, informed by the wider country strategy, a prioritised and funded strategy for local sustainable service delivery should be developed, implemented and monitored[18].

Whilst the political-administration-citizen interface functions within the wider country strategic context, each municipality is autonomously accountable to arrange and manage itself to render its services[19].

The aforementioned shows that the South Africa local government is positioned and enabled in a sound prescriptive and functional and structural configuration to create the foundation to realise a better life for all. Its implementation is in the hands of the political-administration-citizen interface, who are human actors. Simplistically speaking, the prescriptive functional configuration of local government cannot be blamed for failing service delivery or praised for its success. The failure or success lies in how it is administered by the involved human actors. Successful service delivery lies in the will of human actors to arrange and administer matters in a suitable way. There are other factors that hamper good service delivery and service quality: these are such as availability of finances, lack of skills, etc. But this opinion focusses on the influence of the passion for the people and the cause of the people in the combined governance-passion interface.

The local government governance-passion interface

People generally have passion for what they believe in and what their believes are. For a municipality to excel in service delivery, the passion of the human actors in the political-administration-citizen interface should be focused on the people and their cause.

?When the African National Congress came into government in 1996 it was the realisation of a dream to establish a better life for all. Its struggle was driven by the passion for the people and for the plight of the majority of South Africans. The ANC coming into government was an exemplary achievement in the eyes of South Africans and of the world. South Africa, then, as it set out to create a better life for all, stood at the brink of one of the biggest country transformation opportunities in the recent history of the world.

Everything that relates to the ANC government at that stage was driven by the compassion for people and passion for the cause to improve lives and their livelihoods. To achieve this, the three-tier government engine was created (as demonstrated above) that is undergirded by a well-defined governance system. As the years went by, the country-wide local service delivery cracks started to show. It became apparent that these failures were not caused by the lack of a good prescriptive environment, but rather in how it is applied. When it comes to the failure of applied service delivery, it seems that both compassion and passion were diluted in implementation.

But this is a generalisation. Not all is lost in translation as can be seen in the AGSA’s 2020 -2021 MFMA report[20]. There are municipalities in South Africa that manage the political-administration-citizen interface and related service responsibilities and quality very well. In the opinion of the author, what stands out in these more successful municipalities do not only relate to passion, but to the combination of both passion and administration of good governance practices. These two cannot be separated from each other and is shown in the following diagram:

DIAGRAM 3: THE LOCAL GOVERNMENT GOVERNANCE-PASSION INTERFACE

This diagram indicates the handshake between passion and the successful rendering of municipal services. Passion should originate from the human actors in the political-administration-citizen interface as each of the role-players owns, executes, and monitors the fulfillment of their responsibilities. Passion for the people and their cause in the face of a lacking governance system will not realise success and vice versa. A healthy combination of the two is required. This does not mean that there is a general lack of passion in failing service delivery. In such a case, passion is misdirected to something other than the people and their cause. For instance, if the passion of the political component[21] in the political-administration- citizen interface is misdirected, it wields power that drags the administration down with it. This causes weak service delivery and decaying services infrastructure. It is also in these circumstances that the most opportunity exists for fraud. The author is of the opinion that in failing municipalities at least two of the elements in the pollical-administration-citizen interface fail. The most powerful of these three are the political and administrative components.

In areas where service provision is stable or thrive there is a strong passion-governance interface, with the passion focused on creating value for the local citizen as stakeholders.

What then can be done to turn around the general decay of local government services in South Africa? There is no easy answer. Since the early 2000s there were a multitude of interventions and strategies[22] to build capacity in administration, capacitate political structures, and to strengthen governance. But even in the face of all this effort, service delivery decay is rife[23].

With this as background, one can only wonder how the electorate can keep on voting for the same political parties in the long history of deteriorating service delivery and underdelivered promises. In the last two local elections, there is a slight indication that citizen sentiments are shifting. But a big percentage of voters vote in their absence at the polls. There are two reasons for this. The first is despondency with the political system and its increasingly failing service delivery. And the second is that there seems to be no political party in South Africa that is worth voting for? There is not one party that purports a manifesto that can when implemented, lead to a dramatic improvement of local services. Manifestos and political speeches are fraught with empty promises that go nowhere through consecutive political terms.

I believe the current decaying local service delivery is also fueled by a lack of or misdirected passion with related failing governance systems. Politicians are generally power hungry, hence the saying “we are in power” instead of “we are in government”. The former destroys whilst the latter empowers through servanthood. In the presence of a strong correctly focused passion-governance interface: politicians provide leadership that is directed at citizen needs, the administration aligns this with good governance practices, and the citizen needs are measurably met. In South Africa, at the moment, one can deduce that there is a generally weak passion-governance interface in local government, hence the decay in service delivery and infrastructure. BUT citizens, who are on the receiving end of the bad service, are increasingly shifting their votes elsewhere. The next general election will again be an indicator of citizen sentiment. The young democracy of South Africa is maturing. Will those who come into government in the future have enough will to strengthen the passion-governance interface? Or will they fall into the same power trap as the current local incumbents?

In closure, I reflect on a comment by Ms. Tsakani Maluleke, Auditor-General of South Africa[24]:

?

“I firmly believe that courageous, ethical, accountable and citizen-centric leadership is needed to turn the tide in local government. That is why the theme of this general report is Capable leaders should demonstrate change by strengthening transparency and accountability.”

Will it be the current political-administration-citizen interface human actors that bite the bullet to be courageous to focus their passion on the cause of the people and strengthen governance, or will the electorate replace them? Only time will tell.

I was once asked what can be done to remedy the current local government situation. If I can venture a recommendation. I will start with, more stringent governance and compliance requirements will not work, it must still be implemented by human actors. This, in the past, led to strategy being diluted in translation and will continue to do so.

What will work is strengthening citizen accountability awareness of their local governance responsibilities, fostering their MEANINGFUL participation, and strengthening strategic leadership (both politically and in the administration).

Lastly, and we might be too far down the line with this to achieve, take the current local government model back to the drawing board with broad scope participation in its redesign, which includes learning from other countries. But then even with a redesign, it must still be implemented by human actors. Should one then not start with educating and mentoring the current and next generation human actors in the political-administrative-citizen interface with a three-generation mindset? As can be seen from this short discourse on the way forward, there is nothing that can be done across the board to turn this ship in the short-term, but with a concerted effort, the medium to long-term can yield results.

[1] https://www.dpsa.gov.za/dpsa2g/documents/psictm/2013/CGICT%20Policy%20Framework.pdf

[2] https://www.agsa.co.za/Portals/0/Reports/MFMA/2020-21/FINAL_MFMA%202020-21%20GR_15%20June_2022%20tabling.pdf?ver=2022-06-15-095648-557 (Foreword – Page 3)

[3] https://sustainabledevelopment.un.org/content/documents/21252030%20Agenda%20for%20Sustainable%20Development%20web.pdf

[4] https://au.int/sites/default/files/documents/36204-doc-agenda2063_popular_version_en.pdf

[5] https://justice.gov.za/legislation/constitution/SAConstitution-web-eng-02.pdf

[6] https://www.nationalplanningcommission.org.za/assets/Documents/NDP%20REVIEW.pdf (executive Summary)

[7] https://www.dpme.gov.za/keyfocusareas/outcomesSite/MTSF_2019_2024/Final%20Revised%20MTSF%202019-2024%202021.pdf

[8] https://www.cogta.gov.za/cgta_2016/wp-content/uploads/2016/06/Approved-DCOG-Strategic-Plan-2020.2025.pdf

[9] https://www.westerncape.gov.za/text/2020/February/western_cape_strategic_plan_2019-2024.pdf

[10] https://stellenbosch.gov.za/download/draft-fifth-generation-idp-2022-2027_march-2022/?wpdmdl=17379&refresh=633c087124ced1664878705

[11] https://www.un.org/millenniumgoals/

[12] https://sdgs.un.org/goals

[13] https://www.gov.za/government-system

[14] https://www.gov.za/about-government/government-system/structure-and-functions-south-african-government

[15] Local Government: Municipal Systems Act 32 of 2000 Chapter 4

[16] South African Constitution 1996 section 152(e)

[17] Local Government: Municipal Systems Act 32 of 2000 Chapter 4

[18] Local Government: Municipal Systems Act 32 of 2000 Chapter 5 Section 25

[19] Constitution of South Africa Chapter 7 Section 151

[20] https://www.agsa.co.za/Portals/0/Reports/MFMA/2020-21/FINAL_MFMA%202020-21%20GR_15%20June_2022%20tabling.pdf?ver=2022-06-15-095648-557

[21] This is just an example, the passion could be lacking in administration, citizen or in all three elements.

[22] Local Government Turn Around Strategy 2009, Local Government Back To Basics Program 2014, and Local Government District Development Model 2019. There were also various other interventions: skills development, municipalities placed under administration, etc.

[23] https://mg.co.za/politics/2022-09-28-ramaphosa-calls-for-end-to-infighting-in-local-governments/ 175 municipalities approved under funded budgets.

[24] https://www.agsa.co.za/Portals/0/Reports/MFMA/2020-21/FINAL_MFMA%202020-21%20GR_15%20June_2022%20tabling.pdf?ver=2022-06-15-095648-557