Mayor Benson Fihla cracks whip on lack of implementation of Council resolutions

Nelson Mandela Bay Municipality Executive Mayor Benson Fihla cracked the whip in Council today after it became apparent that some council resolutions are not implemented by municipal officials. 

Mayor Fihla called for an audit of resolutions taken during sittings of Council and a detailed report on the progress made regarding the implementation of those resolutions.

The First Citizen recalled a pronouncement that he made in earlier this year about the state of service delivery in Uitenhage and Despatch. He called on municipal officials to attend to the service delivery related issues in the two towns and asked for updated reports at each Council meeting.

“I emphasised and expressed the urgent need to address service delivery issues relating to Uitenhage and Despatch by March this year. I further emphasized that, in future, at all Council meetings updates should be given to Council. To my disappointment, that has not been done. We have to make an audit and get a report on the implementation of all Council decisions to ascertain the progress we are making and the challenge that we are faced with.”

Mayor Fihla further insisted that an item should be included in the Municipal Manager's report to indicate the progress made in the implementation of Council resolutions and the pronouncements made by the Office of the Executive Mayor. 

In the past six months, the NMBM political leadership has been engaging with the communities of Northen Areas of Uitenhage on issues of service delivery, particularly related to housing and the availability of land.

The political leadership and municipal officials, led by the Executive Mayor and the Deputy Executive Mayor, have visited the areas on a number of occasions to inform and interact with the public about the progress and challenges that the Municipality faces in addressing their needs.

During these interactions, the Executive Mayor made it clear to the community that accelerated service delivery, through decisive Council decisions and implementation, would form part of the solutions to the problems of Uitenhage and Despatch.