To turn Makana Municipality around the Administrator needs lots of time, serious financial support for interventions, and people in key positions to work with. Pam Yako has had none of those.
To turn Makana Municipality around the Administrator needs lots of time, serious financial support for interventions, and people in key positions to work with. Pam Yako has had none of those.
What she does have are some funding for infrastructure and some senior Bhisho staff in acting positions – and three months left to make sense of her stay in her former home town.
“I underestimated the extent and depth of the problem in this municipality,” she told Grocott’s Mail in an interview following the release of her final report on the administrative intervention in Makana Municipality.
Yako was appointed in September 2014 by the Eastern Cape’s Co-operative Governance department under Section 139 1(b) of the Municipal Finance Management Act as administrator in Makana Municipality.
At the end of last week she released the Makana Local Municipality Intervention Final Report – a 39-page document that documents the background and terms of reference of the intervention, her initial assessment report, the intervention plan (infrastructure, corporate services and finances), her areas of work and the support received from the district, provincial and national arms of government.
The report concludes by highlighting areas for further attention.
Kabuso Report
An important area of Yako’s work in Makana Municipality, as documented in her intervention report, was the finalisation of the Kabuso Report.
This Council-commissioned document implicated certain Makana councillors and officials in wrongdoing.
Those named in the Kabuso Report included Mayor Zamuxolo Peter and Council Speaker Rachel Madinda-Isaac.
“The Kabuso Report is critical to getting this place stable,” Yako said, confirming that she had now put processes in motion to finalise it.
But she emphasises that these processes are administrative rather than political.
“I can’t solve political problems administratively,“ she said, hinting at some of the upheavals the Report had caused.
“Political problems need political solutions. “The Kabuso Report was intended to solve administrative problems. Because I treated it as an administrative process, not all were happy with the outcome.”
Instability
Emphasising that the report she tabled was not the one Council adopted, Yako said, “Some people wanted it to be a forensic investigation – but it just wasn’t. Councillors gave their views, the audit committee was brought in and they resolved it was an internal investigation. How you deal with auditors is how you follow their brief to the letter. I did.”
Yako said the finalisation of the Kabuso report had sent shock waves through the municipality, both politically and administratively. “That created instability,” she said.
“That’s a huge problem because the biggest thing Makana needs next to qualified people is money. And no one wants to put money into an unstable organisation.”
Trust
Yako is candid about some of the shortcomings of her work in Makana.
She admits she underestimated the extent of the municipality’s problems.
“One thing I didn’t get right is that were certain things for which I expected quick solutions. The problems here have happened over a long period, though, and the reality is there is no quick fix.”
She’s also positive about what she feels has been her main achievement: finding the hidden gems inside and outside the walls of the city hall.
“I have managed to build a network of people who are committed to doing something.”
Her report emphasises that engaging with stakeholders, including communities, has been key to the intervention plan.
This, along with the setting up of five work streams – groups of ordinary citizens and experts prepared to offer support in the areas of community engagement, driving service delivery, governance and oversight, capacitating the municipality and ensuring financial sustainability – is fundamental to making the interventions sustainable.
Politicisation
“Some say I should have started with the hard-core tasks,” she said.
“But I knew I had to try to get the relationship with the community solid, and the municipal administration solid."
She states unequivocally that the directorships in Makana Municipality are highly politicised.
It’s for this reason she’s done her most intensive work with the level below – the managers. There are good people working in this municipality,” she said, “some of them young [and keen to do well].
“Some are embarrassed by what’s happening. “These are people who are off the radar. “They say a fish rots from the head – but if I can get a critical mass of 30 people (the managers) switched on, they in turn will influence the next level, the supervisors, and in this way there will be a bigger impact. “I would like to create a culture of working together, enhancing management capability.”
Funding
Lack of funding is a big obstacle to Makana’s turnaround.
“Although revenue collection must improve, we can’t rely on ratepayers only to solve the problems that have happened here over a long period.”
Yako is positive that while a lack of funding and key skilled people mean the turnaround is hampered, she will have left Makana with plenty to go on with.
Apart from people who are working together better, she aims to leave Makana with a plan of how to fix the infrastructure problems, and a funding model.
“I also aim to leave here with the organogram fixed and done.”
@SusanMaclennan2
