Speech by the Executive Mayor of Cape Town, Alderman
Patricia de Lille, at the full Council meeting on
30 October 2013
Good morning, goeiedag, molweni, as-salaam alaikum.
Mr Speaker, this has been an eventful month for the City.
This year, the City of Cape Town was honoured to receive an IBM Smarter
Cities Grant.
This meant that IBM would send a high-level team of executives from
their operations around the world to work on a business project of the
City’s choosing at no cost us.
Given the talented team we had to work with, we decided to focus on a
particular problem that had come up again and again in our strategic
planning: how to manage, maintain and rationalise our social assets.
Social assets include community facilities, clinics, development centres
and many other examples of installations that serve the community,
either by providing a programme or a service of some kind.
IBM spent a great deal of time interviewing our officials and politicians,
seeking to get to the heart of the issues and proposing ways forward.
In addition to this, they reviewed huge amounts of City information
sources, at both the operational and the strategic level.
Concluding their work last week, they have proposed a model of
integrated, transversal planning that can help us identify, profile and
manage our social assets based on the needs of each individual
community.
At its heart, they have focused on a model of building our social service
delivery model around the individual resident in a ‘citizen-centric’ design.
This means that we have to ask ourselves the question of: what does
each social service mean for the person who receives the service – how
do they perceive it and what are their needs?
In order to do this, they have proposed a delivery framework within the
City focused on transversally addressing common issues related to
facilities across directorates.
This approach will rely on using project and programme methodology to
bring officials together to create shared solutions focused on innovation
and design-led thinking.
This is consistent with our attempt to find creative design-based solutions
for a range of common challenges in the City, an approach which is
consistent with our designation as the World Design Capital for 2014.
More importantly, this approach builds on the work we have already done
to institute transversal management through the economic and social
clusters, a point specifically referenced by IBM.
Not only does this mean we have been moving in the right direction of
creating integrated management in the City, it means that we now have
an opportunity to consolidate the gains we have already achieved and
take our transversal management approach to the next level.
The essential core of transversal management relies on our cluster groups
in Mayoral Committee portfolios which ensure that cross-cutting issues
receive appropriate management follow-through.
As this Council has already seen, the economic cluster ensures that
directorates measure their progress against the imperatives of economic
growth, development and inclusion.
The social cluster bears responsibility for ensuring that we create a safe,
inclusive and caring city.
Our transversal management system has been in operation for over a
year now and I look forward to reporting to Council on the next stage of
its evolution – a stage that will reprioritise existing resources to create
efficiencies in the City.
And if transversal management is about the benefits of working across
boundaries in the City, then we must also look for the value in working
across boundaries across organisations.
I am pleased to announce that this month the City signed a Memorandum
of Understanding (MOU) with the Port of Cape Town committing us to a
new relationship of integrated planning.
Our economic growth strategy has identified the access points into Cape
Town, namely the port and airport, as key levers of our growth.
But like all successful strategies, we have also taken into account what is
within our power to act upon.
And in the South African context, harbours and airports are not under the
municipality’s control.
We therefore need to do everything that we can to understand the
strategies that these entities have so that we can truly position ourselves
for growth in the real-world, South African context, working with all
partners.
That is why I have been leading a new bilateral relationship with
Transnet, specifically the Port Authority of the Port of Cape Town.
We see the port as a major economic gateway for the city. However,
given that we do not control port infrastructure, we also must understand
the port as part of national infrastructure and strategies and Cape Town’s
place within these.
Transnet has designed a national capital infrastructure programme over
the course of the medium to long-term.
The spending regime over the multi-year period has identified certain key
assets as the transport gateways for the country and the region, as well
as the supporting networks between them via freight and rail.
For instance, the Port of Durban, will receive massive investment as a
strategic container port. In comparison the Port of Cape Town is allocated
much less spending by Transnet over the coming years.
However, if we look elsewhere in the region, Transnet will also be
allocating massive resources to the Port of Saldanha given its strategic
role in the oil and gas sector and its relational position to the West African
market.
The City of Cape Town has factored Transnet’s planning into our
strategising.
As such, we understand the investment in Saldanha and its purpose,
especially in the oil and gas sector.
We need this investment for the region as Cape Town would be able to
benefit from multiple down-stream business opportunities.
We can host head-offices, provide business services and other marine and
oil and gas industry support services.
Furthermore, we would then finally develop a strategic understanding of
the Port of Cape Town as a place of down-stream servicing for excess
capacity from Saldanha and as an entry-way for additional cargo goods
and cargo servicing for the region.
Indeed, such investment would serve our long-term goal as the centre of
a dynamic city-region of growth by furthering the west-coast corridor
integration of Cape Town with the potentially major industrial area to our
immediate north-west.
Our MOU will create a formal space where we can discuss matters of
common interest, such as planning infrastructure requirements and
strategies.
This MOU will create bilateral mechanisms for the City and the Port to
engage directly, while also including our partners in the Western Cape
Government, and thereby will create a more efficient city-area.
I am certain that our new relationship will help us unlock our broader
economic potential.
But in looking at capitalising on the economic infrastructure in the region,
we must also focus on the infrastructure that supports the economy
within Cape Town.
In that regard, it would appear that there has been much speculation
about the roll-out of the MyCiTi N2 Express service to Khayelitsha and
Mitchells Plain.
I would like to make it clear to this Council that we have taken another
significant step towards the realisation of the N2 Express Service from
Khayelitsha and Mitchells Plain to the CBD.
On Monday, the City signed a Heads of Agreement (HOA), which will help
pave the way for introduction of the N2 Express Service with the support
of Golden Arrow Bus Services (GABS), the Mitchells Plain Route 6 Taxi
Association and the CATA/CODETA 15-15 Taxi Association.
This HOA flows out of a truly inclusive consultation process which seeks to
create full agreement between the City and its partners.
This is an historic process which, once completed, will help ensure that
the N2 Express and related services can be rolled out in a manner that
will not be subject to disruption.
In terms of the HOA, and at the request of our partners, the N2 Express
Service will be ready for full implementation from July 2014.
We have agreed in principle that in the build-up to the full implementation
of the service, a partial service will be introduced as soon as possible in
the new year.
The construction of the necessary infrastructure and bus stops for the
service will continue to ensure that we meet the new deadline.
I would advise Council that the revised timeline is a result of the need for
extensive and inclusive consultation, as well as a result of factors directly
beyond the City’s control. For example, the delays in the manufacture of
the buses required for the service as a result of the eight-week strike in
the automotive sector.
I have little doubt that, working with our partners, this service will be an
outstanding success, and make a real and lasting difference in the lives of
residents of Khayelitsha and Mitchells Plain.
Mr Speaker, in broadly seeking to create inclusion, we have helped bring
opportunity to a number of our residents in Site C, Khayelitsha this past
week.
In the various delivery formats we have for housing, we have a particular
stream focused on redress, where the City transfers title to beneficiaries
in historical housing projects, where these housing projects were
completed more than ten years ago.
The failure to transfer title in these projects is a national problem, which
has arisen from the fact that many of these areas were not properly
surveyed; were subject to illegal occupation; and a range of other factors.
The City has appointed a consultant to overcome these difficulties and to
ensure that, over the coming years, title is afforded to an estimated
30 000 possible beneficiaries.
Last week’s beneficiaries were residents of Site C, Khayelitsha. The
history of the finalisation of title deeds for Site C residents is a reminder
of our divided past.
The people living in Site C were removed there by the Apartheid regime.
For years they did not have access to full basic services due to the
supposed temporary nature of their community.
Due to numerous problems, including changes in government structures,
project difficulties, surveying difficulties, complications around service
upgrades and difficulties around erven line, what was supposed to be a
smooth process of title transfer has only recently been concluded.
But the series of constructive engagements the community has had with
the current City administration has helped to resolve this process.
Last week, the City issued the first group of 50 title deeds to those
beneficiaries who have been waiting the longest to obtain them.
The rest of the remaining 2 835 title deeds will be issued starting in
November from the Solomon Tshuku Hall in Site C.
This is just one of the ways that we are creating opportunity through
redress of past injustices – a core focus of our desire to be a more caring
city.
And in terms of redress, we have also been making great strides in our
programme to electrify informal settlements.
Last year, the City committed to allocate approximately R104 million to
Eskom to roll out 10 600 electricity connections in Nkanini in a multiphase project
In total, 935 electricity connections were completed in Phase 1.
Phase 2 of the project, which will see 1 600 households electrified, is on
track for completion in November 2013.
Phase 3 will electrify 3 500 households and will be concluded by
November 2014.
Further roll-out of the other phases will continue until 2015 to ensure that
all of the identified households for this project are provided with
electricity.
Access to electricity makes a great difference to peoples’ lives in so many
different ways.
Since 2006, the City has increased its budget for electricity provision by
287%. This massive investment to provide electricity to communities
resulted in 21 305 new subsidised electricity connections between 2006
and 2012 in the City’s electricity supply areas.
This is in addition to the City-funded Eskom supply provision that covers
the bulk of the metro, which has added approximately 8 812 connections
in this same period.
This financial year we have budgeted R292 million to provide electricity to
more informal settlements.
We are partnering with Eskom in a number of electrification projects for
20 000 connections in informal settlements to the value of R190 million.
Indeed, as Eskom recently noted, Cape Town is the only metro that has
committed its full finances to electrifying informal settlements.
Indeed, our commitment to improving the lives of people living in
informal settlements is in keeping with a pledge I made to religious
leaders at the recent Mayoral Interfaith Service that celebrated the beliefs
of the variety of religions in Cape Town.
I have been working closely with the Western Cape Religious Leaders
Forum recently and I want to thank them for agreeing to work with the
City as our partners to make a better future for everyone.
In this regard, I am pleased to announce that the City of Cape Town will
become a part of the Compassionate Action Network International (CANI).
In so doing, we will be officially recognised as a Compassionate City, one
that is committed to compassionate action in city-wide innovation,
community engagement and governance.
Such a commitment to compassion will complement our approach to build
an inclusive and caring city.
That compassion and care for communities presents itself in different
ways.
Recently, the City launched a pilot project to close all identified high-risk
street lanes in Mitchells Plain as part of our broader plans to enhance
safety in the area.
The first phase of the project will prioritise the closure of over 50
problematic street lanes in Portlands and Westridge.
To strike the right balance between creating safe spaces in communities
and enhancing the mobility of residents in these areas, the lanes were
identified using a variety of measures such as:
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Crime statistics from Metro
Services
The number of applications
The number of applications
Public transport routes and
Transport access points
Police and the South Africa Police
received to have the lanes closed
to lease or purchase the open spaces
services
Subsequent to this review, the City initiated an extensive public
participation process to engage the community for their support for this
project.
The closure of these lanes will limit the space where illegal activities take
place in the two communities and ensure that the additional space is used
by residents.
And I am also pleased to report to this Council that our drive to provide
opportunity to people through the Expanded Public Works Programme
(EPWP) has led to our recent formal recognition as the best metro in the
country for EPWP.
Two years ago, we began a campaign of ensuring that all directorates in
the City included EPWP in the project models and set ambitious targets
for the number of job opportunities that we wanted to create.
I am proud to say that, as ambitious as we have been, we are meeting
our own high expectations and even exceeding them.
What is more, our performance was officially recognised last week at the
National Department of Public Works’ Kamoso Awards, which recognise
excellence in the roll-out of EPWP.
We won two of the three awards available.
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The first was in the category of ‘Social Sector: Best Municipality’.
The second was in the category ‘Environment and Culture Sector:
Best Metropolitan Municipality’.
I am convinced, more than ever, that our diversified strategy of
encouraging long-term investment and economic growth in Cape Town,
coupled with immediate financial relief through EPWP job creation, is
starting to pay off.
In conclusion, Mr Speaker, I would like to draw this Council’s attention to
the departure of one of its most committed officials, the Deputy City
Manager, Mike Marsden.
I think everyone in this chamber will be familiar with Mike, not because of
his high position but because he has been in the service of the people of
Cape Town for decades.
Indeed, Mike has worked for the City, and its precursor municipalities,
since the 1970s, starting out as a trainee engineer.
He made his way up through the depots and through our various
management structures, serving as an executive director in a number of
portfolios before eventually reaching the highest level of the organisation
as the Deputy City Manager.
Many of our iconic projects have seen involvement and leadership from
Mike, including the Cape Town Stadium and the initial roll-out of the
MyCiTi bus service.
After many years of service, I hope Mike takes some time out for himself
and his family.
Mike Marsden, on behalf of a grateful city, I would like to thank you for
your years of dedication and wish you well in your future endeavours.
Thank you, baie dankie, enkosi.