On Friday, thousands of residents of the Sedibeng District Municipality are anticipated at the Sharpeville cricket field for the District Development Model (DDM) Presidential Imbizo, which will be presided over by President Cyril Ramaphosa.
The DDM Presidential Imbizo is a vital venue that makes sure the opinions and viewpoints of communities are taken into account and that steps are done to address their problems.
Regomoditswe Mavimbela, Deputy Director General for Content Processing and Dissemination at the Government Communication and Information System (GCIS), explained that the President-led imbizo brings together leaders from all three spheres of government and the community to discuss and possibly find solutions to the problems afflicting their areas.
Mabimbela asked the Sedibeng District Municipality residents to speak out at the imbizo and demand accountability from elected leaders.
“Leave no one behind,” said President Cyril Ramaphosa in his State of the Nation Address. It was done expressly to make sure that everyone in South Africa supported the president’s policy.
In her words, “Government is set up for the people, and this imbizo… is really about the people of Sedibeng getting together and talking with the principals that they elected on the difficulties in the community, as well as looking at the success that has been done in the region by government.”
The imbizo on Friday is scheduled to start at 10am. For real-time updates on events, follow SAnews on Twitter at @SAgovnews and Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/sanewsgovza/.
There is much to do.
The Emfuleni, Midvaal, and Lesedi local municipalities are part of the Sedibeng District Municipality, which has one of Gauteng’s worst unemployment rates, a high degree of poverty, and infrastructure and service delivery issues.
The area’s deindustrialization as a result of the loss of the steel, mining, and manufacturing sectors was a major contributor to the region’s high unemployment rate.
However, a number of government-led initiatives are under way to boost the region’s economy and provide high-quality employment, including the Vaal River Special Economic Zone (SEZ), which is anticipated to generate at least 170 000 jobs.
Local investors committed and pledged R40 billion to the Vaal River SEZ during the Sedibeng Investment Conference last year, and its operationalization is anticipated to rekindle Sedibeng’s industrialization.
At least R700 million has been set aside for the rehabilitation of the Vaal Sewer System in order to solve issues with service delivery, and money is being sought for the improvement of bulk infrastructure, including roads, water, electricity, and sewerage.
According to Mavimbela, the DDM strategy now being used in the region will strive to make sure that those service delivery plans are executed more quickly, effectively, and in a way that meets the requirements of the people.
“The District Development Model is a framework that the Presidency has established to remove obstacles that pertain to municipal service delivery.
It considers a district municipality as a whole… [in order to establish] an all-encompassing strategy to improve service delivery there.
“Before the DDM strategy is implemented in a district, an evaluation of the region is conducted… [to identify] the primary obstacles.
The Ministers who are pertinent to these issues will be there [on the day of the imbizo] so they can personally learn about the issues in the region and get a chance to interact with them, she added.
advancing and tackling obstacles
President Ramaphosa has held at least three more DDM izimbizo this year.
According to Mavimbela, who spoke with SAnews, feedback from those regions shows that the DDM strategy is working to improve the quality of life for locals.
“Our previous izimbizo events took place in Mafikeng (North West province), Mangaung (Free State province), and Carolina” (Mpumalanga province).
The reports that have followed those izimbizo show how quickly the government is moving to address the issues, which may not have received enough attention from the local municipality, she added.