The South African Municipal Workers Union(SAMWU) expressed its dissatisfaction about the Finance Minister,Enoch Godongwana's 2023 Budget Speech as they felt that the budget excluded real financial problems faced by municipalities.
The SAMWU felt that the Minister ignored the real problems that are contributing factor to the failures of the local municipalities across the which are in a blink of collapse.
SAMWU said just as the previous years, the budget has yet again failed to address the many financial challenges faced by the country's municipalities,many of which have literally collapsed and unable to deliver services to residents as per their constitutional mandate.The financial collapse of the country's municipalities can largely be attributed to the failure by the National Treasury to prioritise municipalities based on their financial needs.
SAMWU added that many of the country's municipalities have for a long time been unable to pay workers their salaries on time and in full,while many municipalities have made it a norm to deduct from workers' salaries payments for statutory deductions and others such as pension funds and medical aids and never paying them to the intended recipients.Our view has always been that municipalities are in the coalface of service delivery,yet they are not prioritised when developing budgets.
The SAMWU is not pleased by the budget allocation made by Minister when it comes on country's municipalities and it felt that the allocation is not sufficient to address municipalities issues.
SAMWU continued,as an example,this year's budget has only allocated an additional R8.1 billion and R6.2 billion in equitable share and conditional grants respectively.In total,the country's 257 municipalities will collectively receive R522 billion which translates to just under 10% of the total government expenditure.These allocations to municipalities will not in anyway address the severity of the challenges faced by municipalities,in particular rural municipalities who are expected to raise the necessary revenue to continue delivering services to South Africans.
SAMWU welcomed the relief that was announced by the Minister to municipalities that are owe Eskom over R56 billion because most of these municipalities their accounts are attached for non-payment by Eskom and that alone affects the service delivery and workers salaries.
SAMWU maintained that most of financial problems in the municipalities are not only with Eskom but many of government departments owe municipalities billions of Rands for electricity and services which they have consumed but failed to pay.
The union also expressed its disappointment by the failure of government to attend with urgency of allowing workers to have access into their provident funds money to cover the shortfalls created by salary increases that are not in line with inflation.
SAMWU is one of the biggest union in South Africa which is representing the municipal workers.