An unprecedented show of unity by all councillors of the Nelson Mandela Bay Municipality was acknowledged when the house raised their hands in unity for a well-balanced Adjustments Budget at a Special Council Meeting today. In fact officials could not recall when all political parties voted in favour of a budget previously.
This and the appreciation by opposition parties of the efforts of Dr Danny Jordaan, Executive Mayor, since he took office stood out in a chamber normally mired by intense differences when fiscal matters are tabled for discussion.
Mayor Jordaan said: "Any fair commentator can see that… change has begun…"
"We can either run around lamenting our present difficulties or we can do something about it.
"So in the last nine months we have busied ourselves to restore and build public confidence in the capacity of our Metro Council and administration by making the necessary interventions and sound decisions that have now brought us to this juncture where we can proudly say that we are moving swiftly to change our overall performance and the quality of life of all our communities through effective community participation and partnerships, given the major improvement in the municipality's consolidated cash flow.
"Our consolidated cash flow position has improved by more than R160 million. This has now given us a healthy financial position that shows that the budget is funded with a clear commitment to maintain and improve on efforts to enforce strict cash flow management and continuous monitoring. In addition, the total expenditure of the institution increased with 5.7% from R8.82 billion in the original 2015/2016 budget to R9.32 billion," Mayor Jordaan added.
Further great news for the institution is:
1. The moratorium on the filling of vacancies (in place since June 2015) has now been lifted with R12 million budgeted until June 2016 for the filling of critical vacancies. This follows the work of a Task Team that identified critical positions that needs to be filled with a strategic bias on service delivery departments, and;
2. The draft Integrated Development Plan (2016 -2021) entitled Five Golden Years for Nelson Mandela Bay includes an ambitious and credible programme to set the Nelson Mandela Bay economy onto a new growth path.
Mayor Jordaan committed the next few years of his life to reinvigorate the Nelson Mandela Bay Municipality and to purge it of corruption and turn it into a machine of efficient service delivery.
"I have done this before and is committed to do it again," Jordaan added.
Issued by Municipal Spokesperson Kupido Baron
