Kgatleng District Council Chairman Daniel Molokwe says the year 2022/ 2023 proved a bit challenging in the provision of services to communities as most government departments including the Council had very limited budgets to carry out their day to day duties.

The financial challenges not only impacted on the quality of services offered to the public but also affected the quantity and frequency of services as transport and other key resources were a major challenge among all departments. Most of the district fleet were off road due to maintenance needs which could not be met. Addressing a Full Council Meeting in Mochudi on Monday this week, Molokwe commended the district personnel, as well as the leadership inclusive of the councillors for maintaining high spirits and doing more with the little at their disposal to ensure continuity of services.

“A greater part of our goals were not realised due to delays in processes like procurement of projects which were completely within our control to handle and deal with.

It is a concern that in March 2021 a decision to re- gravel our roads at a cost of P7 million was taken by the executive and a year later the plan to commence work is still ongoing,” Molokwe said.

Programmes like the Constituency Community Projects ( CCP) for financial year 2022/ 23 have not yet commenced. “I cautioned against this slow pace of implementation of projects but there seems to be no improvement,” he explained. This goes against the direction and goals of the current government as prescribed in the party manifesto, as well as the Reset Agenda. He noted that the community is cur

rently not able to access their homes, businesses are unable to access their market because of the state of roads in the entire district.

“We are generally at a state of district urgency in as far as road maintenance

is concerned and hence should expedite our procurement process. The following envisaged critical projects are to start in earnest to address the pending road crisis. “Re- gravelling of all district main road projects through

Road Levy programme as a cost of P7 million, and completion of the CCP projects at our respective wards, using the CCP balances from the previous financial years.”

Going forward, the proposal is to rationalise machinery especially the dozer at the landfill, to alternate its use between the landfill and occasionally for burrow gravel. The council chairman said as part of the TNDP, the 2023/ 2024 Ministry of Local Government and Rural Development budget allocated to cover the Council development budget amounts to P108, 766,503.07 and this will cover both ongoing projects and approved new projects.

Molokwe indicated that this figure is still approximate as the Ministry is yet to allocate funds for Country- Wide Destitute Housing. A whole report on the TNDP which covers all ministries will be reported in the next Full Council session as currently some ministries are still finalising apportionment of their budgets to different districts, he added.