The Cape Agulhas Municipality was recently rated the best local municipality in the country by Good Governance Africa (GGA) on the Governance Performance Index (GPI).
The prime purpose of the GPI is to reflect the importance of good governance at the local municipal level, and GGA has designed it as a tool to influence national-level policy that can improve local governance.
Cape Agulhas Executive Mayor Paul Swart commended all role-players who made this achievement possible.
“Well done to all our officials and management,” he said. “Thank you to the residents of Cape Agulhas for your support. We are faced with many challenges in local government but let’s keep the region on top.”
According to Good Governance Africa “the GPI is a ranking instrument that provides all interested stakeholders with an index of municipal-level governance performance. Governance is about the efficient and productive allocation of resources. Its presence is most keenly felt at the local level.
“Transparency and accountability are the key building blocks of good governance. Their mandate is to improve government effectiveness and to strengthen citizens to hold their governments to account. The purpose of building a ranking index, in the shape of our enhanced GPI, is to equip citizens to this end.
“The GPI reflects which municipalities are excelling and which require improvement. It is, simultaneously, a tool that aids investment decision making as it provides a snapshot of the attractiveness of each local municipality.”
Service delivery was the category that carried the most weight. Some of the main factors affecting the service delivery performance index are: access to piped water, flush toilets connected to sewerage lines, access to electricity and weekly refuse removal.
Administration was the second most important category. Some of the main indicators taken into consideration were financial compliance, accountability and adequate performance in human resources management.
Audit outcomes were one critical measure of performance in the administration category.
In total there are 205 local municipalities and eight metropolitan municipalities that are ranked. Local municipalities are ranked separately from the metros.
Local municipalities were ranked based on data gathered for 18 indicators under three governance categories, namely Administration, Service Delivery and Planning and Monitoring.
The most recent available data (2019-21) was gathered from Statistics South Africa, The Auditor General of South Africa (Audit Outcomes, and the Covid-19 Audit Report) and The National Treasury.
The top performing municipalities are all from the Western Cape, with Cape Agulhas Municipality as number 1, followed by Berg River Municipality and Saldanha Municipality.
Swellendam Municipality was ranked sixth and the Overstrand Municipality seventh. Theewaterskloof Municipality ended in 45th position on the ranking list.– Gurswin Prins (CAM Communication); Source: Good Governance Africa – Good Governance Performance Index – South Africa 2021
