The Facts Tell a Different Story About Tshwane
If Cilliers Brink were an ANC Mayor, he would be regarded by the same people who defend him now as average by any objective measurement of the current state of the City of Tshwane. Do you doubt this? Then challenge yourself to read on.
To demonstrate my point, I am going to outline the factual situation in the City of Tshwane which manifests today after 8 years of many DA Mayors. Perhaps then, you may understand why ActionSA’s continued involvement in this Tshwane government can no longer continue and begin to question why so many are shrilly defending the indefensible state of Tshwane.
ActionSA does not do so with amnesia in the sense that we have been part of this government. It is precisely because we have been part of mediocre governance that we have a duty to act in the interests of those who deserve better, all the residents of Tshwane. However, with constitutional power vested in the Mayor - the DA has run Tshwane since 2016 together with the all-important Utilities portfolio which oversees water, electricity and sewage.
The City of Tshwane, as I write this article, is insolvent with a liquidity ratio of 0.6. Anyone with a financial background will tell you liquidity must be above 1. This means Tshwane cannot meet its short-term liabilities 18 months into Brink’s term as Mayor. The City’s debts to ESKOM have ballooned to a staggering R6.83 billion over which ESKOM will be in court next month against the city, to seek full and final payment of over R4 billion of this debt. The city has a rapidly growing contingent liability of R1 billion owing to municipal workers due to non-payment of legally binding wage increase agreements that it has concluded over multiple years.
The city’s 89% capex expenditure figure is greatly exaggerated by the artificial moving of funds from unperforming projects to those in a position to receive more. Invariably, the projects defunded are those in the townships. The AG’s report found that 37% of capital project milestones were achieved in the 4th quarter of the recently published financial statements and, perhaps most damning, how R12 billion of incomplete projects under construction should be written-off.