Anti-Privatisation Forum slams Cape Unicity’s fake public hearings for Integrated Development Plans
The APF (representing a number of Community Structures, NGO’ S and Trade Unions) notes with great concern the haste with which the City of Cape Town (Unicity) has almost concluded a series of workshops in the areas “controlled” by the “Sub-Councils” into which the City has been divided. In addition a corporate workshop for businesses and companies is to be held at the Cape Town Civic Centre.
Dates, times and venues were supposed to be advertised in the Press and on Posters at Municipal offices. The few “advertisements” that were placed were in tiny print with the result that very few people and organisations attended thus far. The process is finishing off this week.
It seems as if the process of informing us, the citizens of the City, has deliberately, been very low key, as if the more quietly it could be done the better – WHY?
A number of Community Structures, Civic Organisations and Trade Unions were simply not informed. We believe that a period of one month to inform and get a response from 2.5 – 3 million people about a process as important as the planning of future development of the City is completely inadequate.
Chapter 5 of the Municipal Systems Act of 2000 states clearly that Integrated Development Planning must be based on community participation. According to Clause 29 (1) b, the rationale behind the IDP is to ensure that “The local community is consulted on its development needs and priorities; the local community participate in the drafting of the integrated development plan; and organs of state, including traditional authorities and other role players to be identified and consulted on the drafting of the integrated development plan.”
In terms of the law, even the Cape Town Anti-Privatisation Forum should have been consulted during the IDP process.
Chapter 4 of the Act sets out the specific mechanisms and processes for community participation, stating clearly that the local community must participate in the preparation, implementation and review of IDP’s. The law says that apart from public meetings and hearings, all municipalities must hold consultative sessions with community organisations and report back to communities. Municipalities must set up offices where communities can lodge petitions and complaints. The Unicity was supposed to make sure that people with special needs were catered for during this IDP process such as people who cannot reed or write or who have other disabilities, and women.
The Unicity is obliged legally to advertise the public hearings for the IDP processes in community newspapers as well as the Cape Times and the Argus, and also on the public broadcaster in the languages of the community. None of this was done. The Athlone community meeting for example was not even advertised in the Athlone News, let alone on the radio or TV! Many of the Unicity’s fake hearings have also been held late at night when there is no public transport and when it would not be possible for women to attend.
The position of the APF is that in the light of the eviction of families from their homes, as well as the electricity and water cut-offs by the Council, the process should have been more open and our communities should have had greater opportunities to participate.
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Clearly, the “information” the Council expected to get from the few who participated so far will not and cannot be a true picture of our needs particularly in terms of Housing, Water, Electricity, Drainage. refuse removal Sewerage, the Environment and Recreational facilities.
Chapter 5 of the Municipal Systems Act states that “an integrated development plan must reflect—
26 (a) the municipal council’s vision for the long term development of the municipality with special emphasis on the municipality’s most critical development and internal transformation needs.” There is no sign of any future vision to address the needs of the poor in Cape Town.
26 (b) says that the IDP must include “an assessment of the existing level of development in the municipality, which must include an identification of communities which do not have access to basic municipal services”.
For these reasons, the APF may investigate legal action against the Cape Town Unicity on the grounds that it has wilfully contravened the Municipal Systems Act and denied communities the right to participate.
But first, the APF has this morning, in terms of the Promotion of Access to Information Act (2000) demanded the following information:
The documents which identify which communities have no access to basic services
The spatial development framework
The land use management system
A list of the Unicity’s Local Economic Development (LED) aims and objectives
A list of all the media utilised to advertise the community hearings around the IDP’s and copies or transcripts of the adverts
A list of which organs of state were consulted
Reports or minutes from all the IDP meetings held so far
As soon as this information is received, the APF will release it to the media. We are particularly confident that the minutes of the IDP hearings will reveal that tiny numbers of people attended the so-called public participation meetings. Members of the APF who have attended these meetings have reported low attendance, that most of the meeting time is taken up by presentations from council, there is very little time for questions and not every member of the public is allowed to ask questions.
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Issued by the Steering Committee of APF
For comment please call Bobby Wilcox on 7129091 or Faizel Brown on 082 5457883
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