AS WE begin the month of August, which is commemorated as Women’s Month, we are reminded of the revolutionary duty to affirm women in all sectors of society. This is critical if we want to build a non-racial, non-sexist, and democratic society. 

Women constitute the most vulnerable group in society, and we need to redouble our efforts to remove barriers that hinder their progress. This includes accelerating service delivery in communities. It is for this reason that since I was elected to be the Mayor of this City, I have been meeting various stakeholders that are critical in the functionality and financial sustainability of the Municipality. This includes the top management of the Municipality, led by the eThekwini City Manager Musa Mbhele, Co-Chairperson of the eThekwini Presidential Working Group Mike Mabuyakhulu, the Section 154 Support Team spearheaded by Dr Cassius Lubisi and Dr Mike Sutcliffe, the office of the Auditor-General, National Treasury, the KZN Growth Coalition and organised labour. 

I recently had a meeting with the leadership of uMngeni-uThukela Water which is the bulk supplier of water to eThekwini.
It is important to indicate that while over 80 percent of eThekwini residents continue to receive clean drinking water daily, we are concerned that some parts of the Municipality, particularly in rural and township areas, have been without water for a prolonged time. Our meeting with uMngeniuThukela Water was crucial as it formed part of our efforts to ensure uninterrupted water supply throughout the City.

I also undertook an oversight visit to several households in Ward 56 in Inanda who continue to experience water challenges. Through the City Manager, we will working speedily to ensure that all projects that are currently underway in affected areas to improve water supply are expedited. Equally, we will be engaging communities to plead with them to work with us to safeguard water and sanitation infrastructure which is constantly being vandalised. We will also accelerate the rolling out of plans to address the challenge of non-revenue water. As public representatives, we also have a responsibility to spread the message in our communities about the importance of looking after government facilities.

We have no doubt that if we work together, we will succeed in creating a conducive environment for existing business to thrive and attract new investment. This will go a long way in creating sustainable jobs in the City. We are encouraged by the latest news that the Business Confidence in eThekwini has significantly improved. This is according to the latest business confidence report released by the University of KwaZulu-Natal. Last month, we also received confidence-boosting news from the National Department of Human Settlements that eThekwini continues to be the leading Metro countrywide in terms of spending of the Urban Settlement Development Grant (USDG). For the past six years, the City has been spending 100 percent of the USDG grant. This demonstrates that we are on the right path to accelerate quality
service delivery.