President Ramaphosa highlighted on April 21 during an address to the nation, municipalities have found themselves negatively impacted by the pandemic.
Due to the negative impact on the revenue of municipalities, Ramaphosa said funding of R20 billion would be made available to municipalities across the country. This funding was for the provision of emergency water supply, increased sanitisation of public transport and facilities, and providing food and shelter for the homeless.
With the monies being intended to be used for communities, has the Newcastle Municipality received any of the funding? Are our municipal officials ensuring the monies are being spent accordingly?
According to the official comment from the National Treasury, the funds linked to COVID-19 which municipalities received during the 2019/20 financial year was under the Municipal Disaster Relief Grant (MDRG).
These funds were disbursed to all 257 municipalities. The National Disaster Management Centre (NDMC) requested that a portion of the MDRG which was unallocated during the tabling of the 2020 Division of Revenue Bill; be allocated to municipalities in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. This, in turn, follows the declared state of national disaster in terms of Government Gazette No. 43096 on 15 March 2020.
According to National Treasury, an amount of R757 000 was transferred to the Newcastle Municipality in May 2020. A staggering amount which the National Treasury says is funding for immediate COVID-19 related expenditures, which are amongst others, includes the sanitation and disinfecting of municipal spaces.
The Newcastle Municipality was contacted on numerous occasions for comment, to establish if the monies were received and how much of it, has indeed, been already allocated, as well as, where have the monies been allocated too?
The Municipality’s Communication Department has stated, “The equitable share is a financial allocation in the form of an unconditional grant that enables municipalities to provide basic services to poor households, and to enable municipalities with limited own resources to afford basic administrative and governance capacity and perform core municipal functions.”
This statement confirms the National Treasury’s comment on how the allocated funding must be used within the community. Furthermore, the Municipality confirms the amount received towards the COVID-19 relief is indeed, R757 000.
However, the Municipality is concerned about rumours which are currently circulating about the funds. Recently, allegations were made that the monies received are in the area of R100 million and that these monies have gone missing.
“The Newcastle Municipality would like to put it on record, the assertion that the municipality received one hundred million rand in COVID-19 assistance is malicious and spurious. We are gravely concerned by what we term as “fake news” and deliberate misleading of the public. The funds were used for various coronavirus related activities, which were carried out impeccably,” states Mlungisi Khumalo, head of Newcastle Municipality’s Communication Department.
With the Municipality assuring the relief funds are being used appropriately, National Treasury explains the Department of Cooperative Governance (DCoG) is the Transferring Officer of MDRG. As the transferring officer, DCOG is responsible for monitoring the performance of this allocation through the NDMC and reports to the National Treasury on a monthly and quarterly basis.
Therefore, if any of the funds are misappropriated, an investigation into the matter will be conducted.
