The rural areas of Amathole district municipality continue to experience difficulty in accessing water services. The people experience problems despite the fact that the Amathole district municipality, since 2003 has been made a water service authority in its municipal area, which consists of eight local municipalities, namely; Mnquma, Mbashe, Nkonkobe, Amahlathi, Great Kei, Ngqushwa, Nxuba, and Buffalo City. With the water service authority powers devolved from national government to the district municipalities the intention was to speed service delivery. This study investigates the causes of the delays in water service delivery experienced in rural areas of this district municipality. The Buffalo City local municipality is excluded in the study because Buffalo City has as well been given the responsibility of being the water service authority in its municipal area. This study used the questionnaires as data collection tool, and it was distributed to these respondents; chief officials, councilors, and citizens. Due to vastness of the target population sampling was used to reduce the bulkiness of the data. The questionnaire content is based on the phases of the systems theory to see if the policy making processes of the Amathole district municipality are carried out in accordance with the systems theory. The study has found that the citizens are not adequately involved in all the policy processes including the policy analysis and evaluation. This has been found to be a contributory factor in the ineffectiveness of the municipality water service delivery.The spheres of government that operate in silos compromised policy analysis and evaluation of the municipality, and disjuncture of the delivery programs of the spheres and state enterprises caused a huge service delivery challenges for this municipality. The study has confirmed that the Amathole district municipality is experiencing problems, delays, and challenges that make it to be ineffective as a water service authority.

This Study was conducted in Yei River County, Central Equatoria State the Republic of South Sudan from July-December/2012 under the topic: Examining the role of Local Government County Legislative Council in promoting service delivery. The Legislative Council in Yei was established since 2007 inaccordance with the provisions of the Transition Constitution of the Republic of South Sudan, 2011:166, LG Act, 2009:8-29 and Governors’ Decree dated 25/August/2007 with the mandate to enact laws and policies and supervise the Executive to implement its decisions. The study investigated into why there was under performance of Legislative Council in promoting service delivery in Yei River County (YRC) and how can service delivery be improved in YRC. The findings revealed that, the capacity of the Council is low in making appropriate decisions and supervising the Executive to implement its decisions, it lacks the necessary working requirements to facilitate its duties, some of its directives are not implemented by the Executive and negative attitudes towards the work of the Council by some members of the Executive. Despite the difficulties encountered, the Council was able to enact 31 laws, conducted some joint consultative meetings on County projects and the study recommended that, the relevant institutions of Local Government to review the irregularities in the Local Government Act of 2009 to regulate the duties of the Council and to guide the recruitment of the future Councillors, training of the Councillors to improve performance, improve the working conditions of the Council, conduct public awareness on the role of the Council and promotion of exchange programs for further learning purposes. The significance of this study is that, the topic was good according to the participants, the recommendations of the study may be adopted by the Local Government Authorities to address the identified gaps and challenges facing the Council not only in Yei River County but also in other parts of the Country and finally, the report may be used by the University of Fort Hare for further Academic purposes and/or other interested individuals/institutions or organizations of the same or similar objectives.

The aim of the study was to assess the impact of traditional leaders and ward councillors‟ roles on service delivery in Mnquma Local Municipality. Not much research has been conducted in this field. The researcher wanted to ascertain the extent of conflict between traditional leaders and ward councillors in providing services to the communities and provide mechanisms to harness these. In this study relevant literature and legislative frameworks were reviewed. From the literature review, it was evident that service delivery is essential to the communities, and as such, municipalities have a critical role to play. The data collection instruments used, were questionnaires and interviews. In order to achieve the objectives, questionnaires were distributed to the participants and interviews were conducted. After analysing the data, the researcher formulated conclusions and from those conclusions, some recommendations were made.

The purpose of the research is to assess the financial viability of selected urban and rural municipalities in the Eastern Cape. Municipalities that are not financially viable and sustainable will always struggle to deliver basic services to communities. Without sound financial management systems, municipalities will be forced to discontinue their operations. Municipalities, particularly small and rural ones, are not self-sufficient and often rely on grants and transfers to satisfy their immediate short-term goal of providing basic services to satisfy the needs of their communities. Therefore, finance is regarded as an overriding and decisive factor for determining the viability of municipalities. The study seeks to investigate the financial viability of selected urban and rural municipalities in the Eastern Cape. Its key research questions are: Are municipalities able to provide sufficient funds to provide a range of services at an acceptable service level? To what extent do municipalities rely on external funding? Do municipalities have revenue collection capacity and revenue policies? The study asserts that most municipalities lack the required financial resources. They depend mainly on transfers from Provincial Government and equitable share and conditional grants from National Government. Section 152 (1) of the Constitution of the Republic of South Africa, Act 8 of 1996, states, amongst other things, that Local Government should ensure the provision of services to communities in a sustainable manner. The constitution further states that a municipality must strive, within its financial and administrative capacity, to achieve its objectives. The Municipal Finance Management Act, Act 56 of 2003, creates a framework for municipalities to borrow money and determine the conditions for short- and long-term borrowing. The Act assigns clear roles and responsibilities to the various role players involved in local government financial management. According to the Act, an annual budget for a municipality may only be funded from realistically anticipated revenues to be collected. As revenue projections in the budget must be realistic, the Municipal Property Rates Act, Act 6 of 2004, facilitates the collection of revenue in municipalities and establishes a uniform property rating system across South Africa. Property tax is the biggest element of local government tax revenue and is central to municipal finance. The Municipal Systems Act, Act 32 of 2000, amongst its objectives, provides for the manner in which municipal powers and functions are exercised as well as establishes a simple framework for the core processes of planning, performance management and resource mobilisation. The Act also provides a framework for public administration and human resource development. Finally, it also empowers the poor and ensures that municipalities put in place service tariffs and credit control policies that take their needs into account. The research contends that, whilst there is legislation and structures to assist and direct municipalities, it has been established that municipalities do not properly collect rates and taxes due to them to augment their revenue. The study has shown nevertheless that metropolitan municipalities have the capacity to collect revenue for municipal services. This is confirmed by their collection rate which ranges between 94 % and 97 %. There is also the culture of non-payment by communities for services rendered by the municipalities. Rural municipalities are exempted from property tax, while other rural municipalities who have an urban component, have to collect. There is also the question of unemployment and poverty. Consequently, municipalities are not self-sufficient and rely on grants and equitable share to survive. As a result of this lack of self-sufficiency, it is difficult to implement service delivery and also difficult to attract skilled personnel. The study has investigated why some municipalities fail to collect revenue and depend on national grants. The study employed both qualitative and quantitative methods. The findings of the quantitative paradigm have been presented in the form of graphs and charts. The major findings include: All municipalities have limited borrowing capacity; have not exceeded their budgets in terms of their spending; small municipalities have households as their main contributor of revenue collected; metropolitan municipalities get the big slice of their revenue from business; small and rural municipalities rely on grants and transfers and are therefore not financially viable; metropolitan municipalities are, to a great extent, financially viable but lack skills and capacity to utilize their resources for effective service delivery; and all municipalities under-spend their budgets. The study, after elaborating on the findings, makes recommendations on how municipalities should become financially viable.

MPM / Oliver Reginald Tambo Institute of Governance and Policy Studies

MURP / Department of Urban and Regional Planning / Rural municipalities in South Africa have been grappling with delivering quality services to communities due to shrinking revenue bases over the last ten years. The study explored the relationship between consumer debt recovery and municipal service delivery in three selected municipalities in Vhembe District, Limpopo Province. The implications of revenue collection in rural areas was examined through the computation of the Coefficient Effect Size Model which aimed at proving whether rurality had an effect on payment of rates and taxes. A combination of Goal Achievement Matrix and Correlation Quotient analysis were used to explain the linkage between service delivery and the resource base of rural municipalities. The Rurality Quotient and the Coefficient Effect Size were both developed in the study to link the rurality nature of municipalities to the viability of rural municipalities to provide services. The review of literature incorporated an appraisal of municipal policy documents such as the Integrated Development Plans, Spatial Development Plans, Annual Budget Reports and Service Delivery Budget Implementation Plan. The study findings revealed that consumer debts resulted in rural municipalities failing to generate revenue thus affecting internal revenue pockets. Furthermore it was discovered that rural municipalities were recording a negative effect size as well as a negative Rurality Quotient thus proving that rurality directly affected the level of payment of services. The projection showed a significant probability of a steady increase in consumer debts in rural municipalities in the next ten years if the issues and challenges are not addressed effectively. Therefore a Rural Consumer Debt Recovery Framework tool was proposed to provide clear guidelines on how rural municipalities can deal with non-payment of rates and taxes. In addition to this a review and update of all revenue enhancement policies such as the Credit Control and Debt Collection Policy to match the changes occurring over time in rural municipalities is necessary to change the current status of revenue collection in municipalities. / NRF

MAdmin / Department of Public and Development Administration / The main thrust of this study was to examine the effectiveness of the Public Protector’s office in enhancing ethical conduct: The Case of Vhembe District Municipal Area. After the attainment of democracy in 1994, South Africa established the Public Protector’s office and other institutions to enhance ethical conduct within the public service. Despite the establishment of the Public Protector’s office, ethical challenges remained a big problem to achieve good governance and efficient service delivery to the masses of Vhembe. This study followed a mixed research methods and employed a descriptive case study design with explanatory features characterised by the sequential explanatory model strategy in which the collection and analysis of quantitative data was done, followed by the next phase of collecting and analysing qualitative data. Participants in this study were Public Protector’s officials, Mayors, Municipal Managers, Civic Organizations and the representatives of the private (tendering) companies found in Vhembe. The empirical data were collected through questionnaire and semi-structured interview schedule and analysed using SPSS and thematic (content) analysis. Data collection and analysis followed the objectives of the study as a framework. The major finding of the study is that the Public Protector’s office is not effective enough to enhance ethical conduct due to its inability and lack of constitutional powers to enforce adherence and compliance with its recommendations after conducting investigations. As a result, this renders the Public Protector’s office ineffective and unable to enhance ethical conduct effectively. The study therefore, recommends that the Public Protector’s office needs to be provided with sufficient resources as well as more constitutional powers to enable it to enforce implementation and compliance with its recommendations. / NRF

The aim of this mixed-methods research study is to investigate the effectiveness of a Municipal Skills Development Programme (MSDP) in the improvement of service delivery in a District Municipality (DM) in South Africa. A concurrent embedded mixed-methods strategy was used, as it uses one data collection phase during which both qualitative and quantitative data are simultaneously collected and treats both qualitative and quantitative research data gathered on an equal basis. Collected data were not integrated or triangulated but resided side-by-side as two different pictures of the effectiveness of the MSDP. From a total population of 80 managers in the DM and its five Local Municipalities (LMs) who had attended the MSDP, qualitative data was gathered by conducting individual interviews with a convenient sample of 10 managers (Sample 1). Quantitative data was gathered by means of a self-designed questionnaire from a convenient sample of 50 managers (Sample 2). The audio-recorded and transcribed qualitative data obtained from the 10 semi structured interviews were analysed by means of content analysis, while the scores obtained from the 50 survey questionnaires were used to calculate the frequency of responses and then represented by figures and tables. Qualitative findings indicated that the majority of participants (90% of 10 managers interviewed) are of the opinion that the implementation of the MSDP within the DM was successful and has led to improved service delivery. Quantitative results indicated that the total sample of 50 managers rated the MSDP as having improved service delivery in the DM. The overall mixed-methods assessment indicated that the MSDP is a successful way of improving the service delivery in a DM in South Africa and that the attendance of the MSDP by all managers is essential for improving the service delivery of local governments in South Africa. A limitation of the study was that the study was conducted in only one DM and may not represent the views of all local government employees in South Africa. Recommendations were that the relationship between the MSDP and other organisational variables such as productivity, efficiency and effectiveness should be studied, while all managers of the DM who have not yet attended the MSDP should be encouraged to do so. / Industrial and Organisational Psychology / M. Com. (Industrial and Organisational Psychology)

Thesis (M. Dev.) -- University of Limpopo, 2008 / Refer to the document

Thesis (M. Com. (Accounting)) -- University of Limpopo, 2022 / South Africa has seen an increase in population over the years and that has resulted in the increase in waste which has created problems in waste collection. Waste management service delivery has become one of the essential services provided by local municipalities. It is essential for local municipalities to effectively provide waste management services to the public. Therefore, this study aims to examine the effect of the waste management budget on waste management service delivery. A quantitative research approach is used in the study and secondary data was sourced from local municipalities' websites for 12 years, that is, the reporting period from 2010 - 2021. The study tests the correlation between waste capital expenditure, waste operating expenditure, waste collection revenue, Budget performance and municipal waste management service delivery in selected municipalities in South Africa. Using the Generalised Method of Moment (GMM) the results indicated that there is a significant correlation between municipal waste management service delivery and waste capital expenditure, waste operating expenditure, waste collection revenue and budget performance. The study suggests that local municipalities should increase their municipal waste budget to improve the quality of waste management service delivery.