Opportunity Issue 88 - Sept-Oct 2018

Building bridges
between communities
King Cetshwayo District Municipality
is making great strides forward
PROFILE
as uThungulu) covers an area of 8000 square kilometers,
from the agricultural town of Gingindlovu in the south, to the
Umfolozi River in the north and inland to the mountainous
beauty of rural Nkandla. This paradoxical district comprises
the best and worst of the two economies of this country.
“We are home to several of the largest industrial giants in
the world, the retail sector in our urban areas is burgeoning
with economic activity, the agricultural and tourism potential
is boundless and there are ever-increasing opportunities for
local economic development,” says Mkhulisi.
“On the other hand, crippling droughts and deep rural
communities living in abject poverty are also strong characteristics
of the King Cetshwayo district, with a backlog
of water and sanitation service delivery topping our list of
priorities.
“The challenge is to provide basic services such as water
and sanitation to these people while stimulating local economic
development, job creation and the growth of the small
and medium business sector. The need to address poverty is
one of the most critical issues. The municipality enjoys good
relations with the business sector and non-governmental
organizations.”
Development and service delivery are at the top of
King Cetshwayo District Mayor Nonhle Mkhulisi’s
list of priorities. Committed to improving the socioeconomic
conditions of the people of the district, Mkhulisi has
presided over a number of impressive strides forward since
her inauguration in 2017. An early measure of success was
the smooth incorporation of Ntambanana Municipality into
the municipalities of uMhlathuze, Mthonjaneni and uMfolozi,
a process that was closely managed by the district-run Change
Management Committee. However, much more work is to come.
A category C municipality located in north-eastern KwaZulu-
Natal, King Cetshwayo District Municipality (formerly known
Surmounting service delivery
Faced with an extended period of drought, communities
are struggling to survive on water tanker deliveries and
water shortages in many rural areas. However, Mkhulisi
is undaunted.
“We have worked tirelessly to introduce the interventions
which we put in place to ensure the supply of water to the
communities who depend on us for service delivery. These
include the drilling of boreholes, spring protection in areas
where natural springs exist, linking of weirs and small dams
to larger reservoirs to supply small towns, and de-sludging
of dams.”
The district is further characterized by large infrastructure
backlogs, especially water and sanitation, mainly in the
rural areas. It’s a titanic struggle to overcome, but Mkhulisi
focuses on the positive:
“We have achieved phenomenal success in the eradication
of our backlogs in the past 10 years. Our water backlogs
have decreased from 81% to 26.1% between 2001 and now.
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