Poor project roll- out irks Jwaneng Mayor
Innocent Selatlhwa | Monday March 6, 2023 06:00
Ditsie said the delayed projects include Constituency Community Projects (CCP). “Two are ongoing for the financial year 2019/2020 being the construction of the WDC office block at Masaasele (defects and liability period) and the construction of a cottage industry which has not yet started, yet the contractor was awarded and given mobilisation fee.
Another project under the CCP is the construction of a kitchen and classroom blocks at our junior secondary schools which tenders have not floated,” she said.
She further decried delayed rehabilitation of the Mmathethe road for which funds were released last year January and to her disappointment, the tender was just awarded on February 25, 2023.
This is despite the fact that in her November speech, she informed the council that the tender for the project was closed on October 18, 2022 and only for it to be awarded after five months.
“Paving of walkways for Khama III and Marakanelo roads and asphalt overlay for Sechele road in Unit 6 and the procurement of tractor loader has also been awarded on February 25 too. These projects were funded under the Road Levy just like the other projects the ministry awarded P5 million to our council last year May,” she said.
Ditsie also decried that though insurance paid the sum of P435,786.87 for storm damaged Games Room in May last year and to date the tender process for this work is not complete. “These are some of the projects and issues that compelled you honourable members to adjourn the August full council meeting and sought audience with Minister of Local Government on service delivery. We were advised to address the issue at the council executive committee, which we did in October and to my disappointment again there is very little progress on the pending items that are before us.
“Let me call on all of us to join hands in managing projects implementation. Honourable members, I also count on you especially council committee chairpersons to ensure that resolutions taken at committee level are done,” she told the council . Ditsie further pleaded with all stakeholders involved in these roads projects to tighten up their monitoring and supervision so that at the end they deliver high quality roads infrastructure and avoid challenges they have had in our past roads works.
On the council spending and budget, the mayor said for the financial year 2022/23, the council was allocated a budget of P92.9 million to be financed by a Revenue Support Grant of P77.4 million and income from own source of P15,5 million. She said currently spending stands at P83.3 million against a target of P85.2 million.
“The current allocated budget therefore for the financial year 2022/23 is not sufficient to cater for the district needs and this has negatively affected service delivery. We have challenges of over expenditure under utility votes, fuel and lubricants, however, virement from other votes continues to be the only contrary measure,” she said.
Ditsie said for the 2023/24 financial year, the council has submitted through a zero based budgeting a proposed recurrent budget amounting to P148.2 million of which the council has targeted to raise P13.6 million as income generated through its own sources.
She said opportunities to increase revenue from own sources are being explored through credit control initiatives. “To date community consultations are being rigorously conducted through different activities that amongst others include Community Outreach, Invoicing/Billing, Bulk SMS, Administering of Know Your Customer (KYCs) compliance, Issuing letters of demand, reminders and invoices to stakeholders, door-to-door activities and the launch of the collection campaign by myself,” she said.