The drivers of dismal service delivery
South Africa’s local government elections will take place on 1 November (see story on pages 24 and 25). One of the core functions of municipalities is to provide services such as refuse removal, the upkeep of certain roads, and the provision of water and electricity. It is no secret that in many municipalities, authorities have failed to honour these responsibilities. In the run-up to election day, the Bureau for Economic Research (BER) published a research note exploring the reasons why so many municipalities fail to deliver on their mandates. The report quotes a Statistics South Africa General Household Survey released in 2019, which says that only 58,8% of households had their refuse removed at least once a week, down from 65,4% in 2016. Eighty-five per cent of households were connected to…