“Participatory Planning in Local Government in South Africa: Policy, Legislation and Practice”

Yunus Carrim
Deputy Minister of Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs, South Africa

INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE ON EMERGING EXPERIENCES IN DECENTRALISED PLANNING
Anand, India
24-25 March 2011

An Insider Activist’s Perspective
This Conference includes both academics and practitioners, so perhaps I should begin with a qualification. It is that this paper reflects the views of an insider activist politician, and does not have the rigorous quality of a considered, usually more objective, academic paper. But this is not to say that the paper is an uncritical defence or rationalization of the positions of the government or political party the writer represents. That the writer has drawn on articles by academics and other technical experts critical of the government’s positions in preparing this paper might have helped in ensuring a more balanced “insider activist’s perspective”. But, of course, it is for the reader, ultimately, to judge. It must be stressed though that this is an early draft of the paper, and comments on it are most welcome.

The paper is organized around an understanding that to get a better sense of participatory planning in South Africa, it is necessary to have a sense, even if brief, of the system of cooperative government in the country and the role of local government in this. A crucial part of the local government system is public participation, and so the paper deals briefly with this. It focuses thereafter on nature, scope and role of Integrated Development Plans (IDPs) – the system of participatory planning in the local government sphere. The (perhaps inevitable?) gap between policy and legislation, on the one hand, and practice, on the other is then highlighted, and suggestions offered on how the gap might be narrowed. 

 
Local Government as Part of Cooperative Government System
If the South African state is to be understood in conventional terms, it would perhaps be useful to say that it is a unitary state with some federal features. We, in South Africa, like to think though that we have broken out of the mould of unitary versus federal systems of government and shaped our own unique system of cooperative governance. We have a population of some 50 million, nine provinces and 283 municipalities. We speak of three spheres, not levels or tiers, of government – national, provincial and local – which are part of a single system of cooperative government. So local government is not a third level of government crudely subordinate to national and provincial government1. It is a distinct sphere of government. But it is not completely independent either. It is interrelated with the other two spheres of government. As  the Constitution of South Africa (1996) puts it, ”government is constituted as national, provincial and local spheres of government which are distinctive, interdependent and interrelated” (section 40.1) In theory, the more each sphere cooperates with the other two, the stronger it can become.

The powers and functions of each sphere of government are set out in the Constitution of the country. These include the exclusive powers and functions of each sphere and the concurrent powers and functions shared between national and provincial spheres. The powers and functions of local government are enshrined in the Constitution2, and can only be amended with a two-thirds majority of the national legislature.
The Constitution provides for a developmental model of local government.  So local government is not just an important site for the delivery of services, but is crucial for the economic and social development of people. Section 152 of the Constitution sets out the aims of local government as:
    a.    to provide democratic and accountable government for local communities;
    b.    to ensure the provision of services to communities in a sustainable manner;
    c.    to promote social and economic development;
    d.    to provide a safe and healthy environment;
    e.    to encourage the involvement of communities and community organizations in the matters of local government.
The current model of local government in South Africa came into effect with the first fully democratic elections held in this sphere in December 2000. The model was an outcome of the major mass struggles waged against apartheid, in particular apartheid local government, and protracted negotiations between the African National Congress, other political parties and various local government stakeholders, especially between 1990 and 1998.

The new local government model entailed the rationalization of a variety of racially-defined local authorities and the demarcation of the boundaries of new non-racial municipalities by an independent Municipal Demarcation Board. This led to a reduction in the number of municipalities from over 1200 during apartheid to 283.  These municipalities together make up the local government sphere. There are three categories of municipalities – Metropolitan, Local and District. Metropolitan municipalities are the big cities that exercise all the local government powers and functions in the Constitution. Outside the big cities, Local and District municipalities share these powers and functions in a two-tier system. There are an average of five  Local municipalities that fall under a District. The role of a District municipality is essentially to ensure the coordination of the Local municipalities covering its area by basically providing regional development planning, bulk services and capacity-building programmes, and promoting the equitable distribution of resources and services among the Local municipalities.    
There are currently 6 Metropolitan, 47 District and 231 Local Municipalities. For the 18 May 2011 local government elections, the Demarcation Board has re-drawn boundaries to provide for 8 Metros, 44 Districts and 226 Local municipalities.

The South African local government model provides for integration between community participation, five-year development plans for the term of a municipal council, budgeting, and performance management. Municipalities are meant to raise their own revenue for the most part. They receive a share of the national budget in terms of a formula (currently they get 9% of the national budget) and are also allocated conditional grants for specific national programmes and projects that have to be fulfilled by local government.  

The local government model is advanced, progressive, transformative. Unfortunately, it is not working well in practice. There are a variety of reasons for this, including the lack of capacity, inability to raise enough revenue, inadequate intergovernmental fiscal transfers, the complexity of the two-tier model of District and Local municipalities, inadequate community participation, undue party political interference in municipalities and corruption.3  The government is undertaking a major review of the local government model as well as the powers and functions of all three spheres of government. The aim is to ensure far more effective cooperative government system as part of building a more developmental state with the more active participation of the people. The more effective the cooperative governance system is, the more the conditions of a developmental state are created, and the more a developmental state is built, the more the conditions for a more effective cooperative governance system are created.

A major aim of the review is to ensure that there is a significant improvement in local government service delivery and development, and greater community participation. There is a sense among key stakeholders today that the ANC may have been too ambitious in giving local government the degree of autonomy it has. There is increasing stress on the need for a more integrated cooperative governance model in which provincial and national government are much more actively involved in monitoring and supporting local government to ensure it more effectively fulfill its functions. The aim through this intervention is not to erode the powers of local government but to strengthen it by giving it more support from the other two spheres. The review is not likely to lead to a complete overhaul of the model, but some aspects of it are likely to be changed. The government will engage fully with all the relevant stakeholders and the public on the review. The intention is to finalise the changes to the local government model before the local government elections that follow the May 2011 elections.

Community Participation in Local Government
A defining feature of the South African local government model is the space it offers to ordinary people to become actively involved in governance. In fact, uniquely, the legal definition of a municipality is that it comprises not just the councillors and the administration, but the local community as well. Deriving from this definition, each of these inter-related groupings has certain rights and duties. These are based on the Constitution and set out mainly in The Local Government: Municipal Systems Act (2001). As pointed out above, among the aims of local government set out in the Constitution are “to provide democratic and accountable governmen

t for local communities” and “to encourage the involvement of communities and community organizations in matters of local government”.
In terms of The Municipal Systems Act a municipality “must develop a culture of municipal governance that complements formal representative government with a system of participatory governance”.  The Act makes it clear that residents have the right to contribute to the municipality’s decision-making processes. They also have the right to submit recommendations and complaints to the council and are entitled to prompt responses to them. They have the right to “regular disclosure of the state of affairs of the municipality, including its finances”. In order to encourage residents to pay promptly for their services, municipalities are required to inform them about the costs of providing the services, the reasons for the payments of the fees, and the uses to which the monies raised are put. Residents also have the right to give feedback to the municipality on the quality and level of services offered to them.
Residents are encouraged to participate in the:
    •    preparation, adoption, implementation and review of IDPs;
    •    preparation of a municipality’s budget;
    •    establishment, implementation and review of a municipality’s performance management system;
    •    monitoring and review of a municipality’s performance;
    •    decisions about the provision of municipal services.
 
Municipalities have to use their resources and annually allocate funds in their budget, as they can afford, to develop a culture of community participation. Municipalities have to contribute to building the capacity of the local community to participate in municipal affairs and the councillors and staff to foster community participation. In establishing structures and processes for community participation, the special needs of women, the disabled, the illiterate and other disadvantaged groups have to be taken into account. In terms of The Local Government: Municipal Structures Act (1998) a municipality’s executive has to give an annual report on the extent to which the local community has been involved in municipal affairs. The executive must “ensure that regard is given to public views and report on the effect of consultation on the decisions of the council”.

Crucially, the model provides for Ward Committees to be set up in each ward of a municipality in order to “enhance participatory democracy”. A Ward Committee may make representations on any issue affecting a ward to the councillor or through the councillor to the council.  It can also exercise any duty or power delegated to it by the council. A Ward Committee comprises the ward councillor as the chairperson and up to 10 other people representing a “diversity of interests in the ward”. Women have to be ”equitably represented” in a Ward Committee. While a municipality may meet the administrative costs of a Ward Committee, it cannot offer committee members a salary. In terms of the Code of Conduct in The Municipal Systems Act, councillors are required to have at least four public report-back meetings.

But if residents have many rights, they also have duties.  They have to take responsibility for ensuring that the municipality functions effectively. They are required to promptly pay the municipality monies owed to it, within the framework of an indigence policy for those who cannot pay. They have to respect the municipal rights of other residents, comply with by-laws, and co-operate with councillors and officials who are fulfilling their legitimate roles. Essentially, the model, overall, seeks to provide a balance between giving residents the fullest space to participate in municipal affairs and ensuring the right of councillors to ultimately govern.
It is an advanced, progressive model of community participation. But it is not working well. Among the reasons: most municipalities meet their obligations on community participation only nominally; there are not enough funds and other resources; Ward Committees have become sites of unnecessary and divisive political contestation instead of representing a range of civil society interests; there is no explicit legal obligation for a council to seriously consider proposals from Ward Committees; and sections of many communities have lost confidence in municipalities (as is attested to by a spate of service delivery protests targeting local government). 

The government feels that it is important that there is much more active community participation in local government and is reviewing the community participation provisions of the model as part of a review of the overall model. A key proposal emerging is a significant strengthening of the Ward Committees through various means. Proposals on empowering communities to play a more active role in local government will be taken to key stakeholders and the public before they are finalised.

Scope, Nature and Role of Integrated Development Plans (IDPs)
Interestingly, in South Africa the notion of developmental planning was first introduced in the local government sphere. It is only more recently as the country has edged towards the notion of a “developmental state” (and not just been content with just developmental local government), that national and provincial planning has begun to be emphasized more seriously. And following the April 2009 national and provincial elections, a National Planning Minister was appointed in the Presidency and a National Planning Commission appointed to devise a long-term plan for the country. Part of the explanation for this lag on developmental planning is the emphasis the government put until recently on winning over the private sector and securing investment, especially from international business, and this reliance on market forces tended to eclipse the importance of a state-led national development plan.   But with the disappointment in the levels of private sector investment, and in the wake of the 2008 global economic and financial crisis, the government has increasingly turned towards a state-led growth path. The national development plan being prepared will have implications for development planning in local government. But what, in the first instance, is the local government planning model at present?

In terms of The Municipal Systems Act, each municipality has to develop an Integrated Development Plan (IDP) reasonably soon after local government elections for the five-year term of the council. Important aspects of the IDP should ideally be based on key elements of the Election Manifesto of the party that wins the elections. Essentially, an IDP is meant to be a community-driven and council-led municipal strategic plan based on the needs of residents organized into goals and priorities, and aligned to resources, providing a framework for municipal budgets, programmes and projects. The IDP is reviewed annually before the budget is prepared. Where possible, the five-year IDP should be part of a longer-term strategic development plan.
The IDP approach marked a major shift away from the previous narrow focus of planning on physical development, zoning and land use. It refers to strategic development, which is a holistic and participatory approach, balancing social, economic, environmental, governance, institutional and financial considerations.

Academics suggest that the IDP was a South African response to the international trends at the time, and refer to the influences of the 1992 Rio World Summit on Sustainable Development and the importance placed earlier by the World Bank and United Nations institutions on decentralized planning. It was, they say, also a response to the “New Public Management” discourse and the “Third Way” approach of Tony Blair and Bill Clinton.5     
Yes, mainly true, but there were also several very South African political imperatives for IDPs. Some of them are dealt with in the next section of this paper. The emergence of IDPs also has to be understood in terms of the “Reconstruction and Development Programme” (RDP), the ANC’s 1994 election platform, which was basically a social democratic programme with an emphasis on people-driven development. The huge inequalities bequeathed by apartheid, not least in the provision of basic municipal services, which needed speedy redress also explains the strategic planning approach in local government.  Important too were the pressures to erode the deeply entrenched apartheid spatial patterns. 
The IDP flows too from the notion of developmental local government referred to earlier. Section 153 of the Constitution sets out the “developmental duties of municipalities” as:
A municipality must –
    a.    structure and manage its administration and budgeting and planning processes to give priority to the basic needs of the community, and to promote the social and economic development of the community; and
    b.    participate in national and provincial development programmes.
 
The White Paper on Local Government (1998), notes:
Developmental local government is local government committed to working with citizens and groups within the community to find sustainable ways to meet their social, economic and material needs and improve the quality of their lives.
Section 25 of the Municipal Systems Act  requires that “each municipal council must, within a prescribed period after the start of its elected term, adopt a single, inclusive and strategic plan for the development of the municipality” which “ a) links, integrates and co-ordinates plans and takes into account proposals for the development of the municipality;  b) aligns the resources and capacity of the municipality with the implementation of the plan; and c) forms the policy framework and general basis on which annual budgets must be based….”. The IDP must also “be compatible with national and provincial development plans and planning requirements binding on the municipality in terms of legislation.”

In terms of The Municipal Systems Act, the core components of an IDP should also include a municipality’s local economic development plans, a spatial development framework, disaster management plans, a financial management plan with a budget projection for at least three years, and key performance indicators and targets. The IDP should also include the municipality’s internal transformation plans.
The IDP is meant to coordinate the programmes, plans and projects of national and provincial departments that are to be implemented at local government level. The IDP should ensure more effective use of limited resources, encourage fiscal responsibility, attract additional investment and funds, speed up delivery, strengthen democracy, erode apartheid spatial planning and promote intergovernmental relations. The IDPs are also meant to provide an open and transparent basis for communities to evaluate the performance of municipalities.

To emphasise the importance of IDPs, The Municipal Systems Act, defines the IDP as “the principal strategic planning instrument which guides and informs all planning and development, and all decisions with regard to planning, management and development, in the municipality”, and it “binds the municipality in the exercise of its executive authority, except to the extent of any inconsistency between a municipality’s integrated development plan and national or provincial legislation, in which case such legislation prevails”.  The Act also states: “A municipality must give effect to its integrated development plan and conduct its affairs in a manner which is consistent with its integrated development plan.”
In terms of The Municipal Systems Act, community participation is embedded in the entire IDP process. Even before a municipality adopts a particular process, in terms of the Act, to guide the planning, drafting, adoption and review of the IDP, it must consult the community. The community must have a say on what its needs, goals and priorities are, and what strategies, programmes and projects it believes can reasonably address their concerns. Municipalities can engage with communities on IDPs in a variety of ways, including through community meetings, Ward Committee meetings, IDP Forums and various workshops of stakeholders.  

Each District municipality must, after consulting the Local municipalities within its area, develop a District-wide IDP that provides a framework for the Local municipalities to decide on their IDPs. The provincial government member (Member of the Executive Council - MEC) responsible for local government has to monitor and assist municipalities to finalise their IDPs. The MEC has to ensure that both the process of adopting the IDPs and their content meet the requirements of the law, and that the IDPs of different municipalities are not in conflict with each other, including those of the Districts municipalities and the Local municipalities that fall under them. Should there b a dispute between the provincial government and a municipality about the IDP, an ad-hoc mediation committee of representatives of all three spheres of government has to attend to this. The MEC also intervenes if there is a dispute between a municipality and the community on the drafting, adopting or reviewing of an IDP.  

This then, in brief, is the concept and the law. What about the practice? 

Challenges in Implementing IDPs
The proposal to have IDPs was first introduced as an amendment to the Local Government Transition Act in 1996, but in the form described above was introduced in 2000 in the Municipal Systems Act. It was quite an advanced initiative at the time. It was well meant. But it is not working satisfactorily in practice. There are many simple and complex, as there are many predictable and unpredictable, reasons for this. We will not be able to deal with all the difficulties in this paper, but will touch on some of them.
There is general consensus among government representatives, planners, academics and others that, overall, IDPs are not working well. The differences are about how not well, what the reasons are and what can be done about it. It is difficult to tell precisely how IDPs are faring. In 2004, Council of Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) research revealed that 37% of the municipalities demonstrated the ability to develop and implement IDPs. 35% of municipalities, it found, had the most basic institutional requirements and capacity, but relied on expert support and assistance when it came to developing and implementing IDPs effectively and did not have a complete sense of ownership of the IDP. The remaining 28% lacked the necessary basic institutional capacity for planning, and faced huge challenges in developing an effective IDP. While, overall, there has been some improvement in IDPs since then, these figures still have broad relevance today. It is likely that some municipalities are devising far more effective IDPs than they were in 2004 while others have become worse – the gap between the best and worst has probably became greater.

Our Department, CoGTA (Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs), previously named DPLG (Department of Provincial and Local Government), conducted major public hearings on IDPs and published a report (DPLG, 2005).  DPLG also did a review of IDPs in six cities in 2007 and CoGTA a state of local government report in 2009. The overall sense is that there has been a slight improvement in IDPs generally, but they are not as effective as they should be.   

But it does not do to exaggerate either. For all their weaknesses, IDPs have contributed to better functioning of municipalities. Even that councilors, administrators and civil society activists speak of IDPs at all is useful in internalizing the notion of strategic planning. Without IDPs, however poor the quality, municipalities would be less focused and directed, and the links between plans and budgets even more tenuous. In many municipalities basic services have been prioritized through IDPs and municipal funding allocated for projects in the IDP. IDPs have helped to shift spending towards previously neglected areas. It is unlikely that some of this would have happened if it were not for municipalities being forced to draw up IDPs. Clearly though, there is a need to significantly improve IDPs. What are some of the problems that need to be addressed?

Those who processed the White Paper on Local Government and the legislation on the new local government model through parliament, not least the writer who was the committee chairperson at the time, are the first to admit that we made several mistakes with the model. While the principles, values and goals of the  model are correct, aspects of it are difficult to implement, and are, as explained above, being reviewed.6 Some of these aspects relate to IDPs.  While the overall IDP approach seems to be sound, the implementation of parts of it is difficult, certainly for many municipalities, and so the policy and legislation will have to be appropriately amended.
The IDP approach, as with the overall local government model, was largely shaped by MPs and administrators who came mainly from an activist background in the anti-apartheid civic or residents associations of the 80s. Most were from the UDF (United Democratic Front), which was the ANC (African National Congress)-linked broad internal mass movement, and were based in the country, not in exile.  This background partly explains the approach to local government community participation and planning that was taken.

The approach broadly reflected, among other issues, the following:
    •    A perhaps too romantic view, based on experiences of the massive civic struggles of the 80s, of what was possible in mobilizing communities to take significant responsibility for planning and governance in the new terrain of democracy.
    •    Although not clearly spelt out, a concern that with the collapse of the Berlin Wall, all planning was being jettisoned and market forces were becoming too dominant. But what about democratic planning from below was the response? And where better than local government to create the space for this? 
    •    The new democracy in South Africa was moving towards a too market-dependent growth path at the time and a local government participatory planning approach was a vague, subtle attempt to redress the imbalance.
    •    There was a failure to appreciate the acute lack of skills and experience among politicians, administrators and communities to manage the technical complexities of development planning.
    •    There was insufficient understanding of how difficult it would be to get provincial and national government departments to align their local government programmes, plans and projects with IDPs, let alone give support to municipalities to ensure effective IDPs.
    •    There was an inadequate understanding of the challenges of having constitutional, policy and legislative imperatives for local government to have development planning without commensurate requirements for development planning at provincial and national level.
A flaw in the policy and legislation is the requirement that all municipalities, from the strongest urban metros to the smallest rural municipalities must develop similar comprehensive IDPs, irrespective of differences in capacity, budgets and other resources. Practice has shown that this “one-size-fits-all” approach is not workable. It has led to many lengthy, mechanical, arid, compliance-driven IDPs that are not necessarily implemented. Many IDPs have become too complex and technical and are not the dynamic instruments of strategic planning that they are meant to be. The Spatial Development Frameworks in the IDPs, say government officials and planners, appear as  simple mapping exercises, rather than providing analytical and strategic guidance for future spatial development. IDPs have not had much of an impact on transforming the spatial disjunctures of apartheid. Unfortunately too, there is a lack of planners or others with similar skills to draft IDPs.  
Clearly, those who shaped the policy and legislation intended that the five-year IDP should, over time at least, become part of a longer-term, maybe 20 or 25-year, development plan. But most municipalities, apart from the Metros and bigger Local municipalities, have stuck to plans that obtain for the five-year term of a Council. New councils are meant to look at the municipality’s previous five-year IDP as a base from which to develop a new five-year IDP, but some Councils tends to ignore previous IDPs. Trying to get District and Local municipalities to devise IDPs that are in synergy has also been challenging. The role of provincial MECs in monitoring and supporting municipalities in devising their IDPs has been varied but overall not adequate.   

Obviously, the first IDPs done in terms of the Municipal Systems Act for the 2000-2005 period were done hurriedly and most were not particularly good. Many were done by consultants who usually did not transfer skills to municipal administrators. The same consultants often drafted  IDPs for several municipalities, and sometimes they simply did what came to be known as “cut and paste” jobs, with hardly any, and in some cases no, community involvement. This is what members of the parliamentary local government committee, in which the writer served at the time, gathered from parliamentary briefings and hearings as well as study visits to municipalities. But the committee felt then that many of the difficulties were understandable and that IDPs would steadily improve over time. The committee welcomed the government’s decision to establish PIMS (Planning and Implementation Management Support) Centres in each District to assist municipalities with IDPs. While this helped in some cases, the overall improvement was not significant enough. The PIMS Centres were later absorbed into the District municipalities.  
Perhaps the biggest challenge has been to get national and provincial departments and state-owned enterprises (SOEs) to link their plans, programmes and projects with municipal IDPs. The IDP was meant to be a vital means of intergovernmental planning, but it has not turned out so. Part of the problem is the lack of clarity in the Constitution and legislation on what the planning powers of municipalities are as distinct from the planning powers of provincial and national government.7 Also planning regulations affecting local government are administered by different sectoral departments and are fragmented and inconsistent. The provincial ordinances of the apartheid order also still apply.

Provinces have developed Provincial Growth and Development Strategies (PGDS), but these have usually not adequately taken into account the IDPs of the municipalities in the province. Municipalities have also not often taken into account the PGDS and other provincial and national department sectoral plans. Many departments do not, unfortunately, have spatialised sector plans. The three spheres of government do not adequately share planning, programme and project information, with departments operating with different systems that do not talk to each other. DPLG, with the help of the CSIR, set up a useful IDP Nerve Centre to encourage information-sharing and coordination across the spheres,8 and subsequently handed the work it began on this to the Development Bank of Southern Africa that has merged it into its database on local government, L.G.net.

The importance of the IDPs has been stressed in many intergovernmental relations forums. In fact, in December 2001. The Presidents Coordinating Council that brings the three spheres of government together decided to “accelerate the implementation of a system of state-wide planning wherein the Integrated Development Planning (IDP) serves as the basis for aligning policy, planning and budgeting processes across all spheres". Again, in May 2003 the national Cabinet decided that national and provincial departments should develop capacity to more actively support IDPs and develop guidelines on how to align their local government projects with IDPs. A National Spatial Development Perspective has also been developed. Unfortunately progress has been slow, but with the appointment of the new Minister of Planning and the National Planning Commission referred to above, a new impetus is emerging for intergovernmental coordination on planning.

The extent of public participation in IDPs varies across municipalities. The commitment of municipalities ranges from mechanical compliance with the law, if that, which involves very little community participation and is of little, if any, effect, to generally half-hearted consultation with reasonable numbers of people to some limited effect, to largely genuine engagement in a minority of cases in which communities take a fair measure of responsibility for IDPs and participate actively in aspects of its implementation. 
Public participation is crucial to effective IDPs. But getting effective participation is difficult. Councils and administrators have to be trained to be good listeners and to encourage community and stakeholder participation through a variety of forms. It is never easy to tell how minimal or extensive a draft IDP framework should be to facilitate initial discussions at meetings of communities or representative organizations, and wrong choices in this regard can have negative consequences. IDP documents often deal with strategic and technical issues, but to encourage participation they have to be brief, user-friendly and accessible – which many are not. Besides general community meetings where everybody is allowed to participate, there have to be smaller meetings and workshops of key representatives to have more in-depth discussions on more strategic and technical issues. Municipalities have to establish IDP Representative Forums, including representatives from business, labour, community and other organizations. Many municipalities also draw in representatives of the Ward Committees in the IDP Representative Forums, besides also engaging with Ward Committees separately. In many municipalities traditional leaders or their representatives also need to be included. Most municipalities do not ensure effective participation of the private sector – and they need to attend to this.  Of course, it is not always easy to identify the key stakeholders who should participate in IDP meetings. Just how representative are some of the participants in the IDP structures and do they report-back to their constituencies and get mandates? It is not always clear.

Often engagements with communities on their needs as part of the IDP process ends up with little more than popular “wish lists”.  There is an understandable tension between the communities’ immediate needs and the municipality’s strategic considerations of a five-year plan that has to take into account various competing needs and be implemented with limited resources. As a DPLG review (2007) notes: “Communities often prioritise visible delivery needs, and do not understand the importance of invisible service delivery needs, such as bulk infrastructure”. Sometimes councilors, instead of seeing the IDP as primarily a municipal-wide strategic plan, tend to push for their pet projects or the immediate needs of their constituents which can, at times, undermine some of their constituents’ long term interests. The stress is on quick wins rather than developing a long term strategy with sustainable outcomes. Also, some of the issues people raise, like housing, education, crime and jobs are primarily the functions of national and provincial government, and municipalities cannot on their own deliver on them.
Clearly, ensuring effective participation requires considerable energy and resources. Securing consensus in communities is by no means easy, especially in informal settlements. Some of these communities are contested, complex and multi-layered, with changing loyalties and fluctuating leaderships. In some communities, different strata or factions constantly compete for hegemony. Ensuring stable participation is not easy. But it is precisely because of these circumstances that community participation is so important. 

Overall, while the level of participation in the IDP process has not been adequate, there has been significant participation in some municipalities over different times.9 Usually, the bigger and better-resourced municipalities have had higher levels of participation. Obviously, participation is not just about numbers, but quality too. Ultimately, what is clear is that without effective community participation IDPs and indeed local government as a whole will not work properly.
Essentially then, there are several problems in implementing IDPs. Some flow from policy and legislative inadequacies, which need to be attended to, but others can be addressed through national and provincial government providing the necessary resources and support to municipalities and by municipalities taking effective practical decisions and acting on them. While it would be foolhardy to gloss over the problems, it would be naïve to expect that IDPs would be implemented effectively overnight, certainly in the difficult circumstances. The challenge, ultimately, is for all roleplayers – government, business, labour, communities and any other stakeholder – to work together to make IDPs work better!

Towards More Effective IDPs
Whatever the weaknesses of IDPs, they are here to stay; indeed they are ever more necessary. As part of the country’s commitment to building a developmental state (and even without it), development planning is necessary, in fact, across all spheres, and the appointment of a new Minister of Planning and the National Planning Commission with a mandate to devise a long term development plan for the country will serve to highlight the importance of IDPs. National and provincial government will be forced to take IDPs more seriously in future, and also provide more support to municipalities to develop better IDPs. It will not happen overnight but the prospects are much better that it will - over time.
IDPs both reflect and contribute to the general challenges that municipalities face. To significantly improve IDPs, aspects of the overall model need to be changed (even if it is the case that if IDPs improve, the current model will work better). There needs to be greater progress on the review of the model and the cooperative government system as a whole referred to earlier. While some aspects can be changed reasonably soon, most will have to wait on the ANC’s December 2012 Conference which will guide government on what changes the rank-and-file of the ANC (a significant number of whom are local government councillors or officials) believe it should pursue.

Unlike in other countries, the term “decentralisation” is not much used in South Africa, not at least by ANC politicians or government officials. Not that the concept or a similar one has not had an impact - but it may be that the term in our context is too closely connected to federalism. It may also be because it connotes, in the context of our very racially divided past, undue separation. And it may be too that with the huge inequalities in our society the term does not sit easily with the need to ensure effective redistribution. We chose to have a cooperative government system, in which, as explained earlier, local government is one of three spheres of government that are distinct, but also, interdependent and interrelated. As much as local government has significant and constitutionally-enshrined original powers and functions, provincial and national government have the constitutional right to intervene in municipalities if municipalities are unable to function effectively.
It is likely, given the challenges local government is facing that we will move towards a more integrated cooperative government system. The more this happens the more likely it is that provincial and national government will have to give more support to municipalities to devise more effective IDPs, especially in the context of the new national development plan being developed. The answer for us right now is not greater “decentralisation”. We have given local government significant powers and functions, but municipalities are having difficulties exercising them effectively. We do not need to substantially change these powers and functions, but we do need to ensure more effective support from national and provincial government for municipalities to perform better.

We speak of the need, it must be stressed, for more effective cooperative governance, not just cooperative government. More active intervention of provincial and national government in local government needs to be complemented by greater public participation in municipalities. The various proposals on strengthening Ward Committees referred to below and other forms of public participation are important in this regard. Insofar as “decentralisation” refers to active public participation in local government, it certainly has considerable resonance in South Africa. And it is not just that government is committed to active public participation, but, more importantly, significant sections of the public have on their own decided on this and  through their struggles create more space for public participation (though some forms of their engagements with municipalities, like destroying much-needed libraries, schools, clinics and the like, and other forms of coercion and violence, while understandable, are not acceptable in an open democracy, and do not necessarily create any more space or result in sustainable outcomes.)
It has to be stressed that the changes pending are not, as some seem to suggest, a central state “top-down” intervention in municipalities, but more effective cooperative governance with both greater provincial and national engagement in local government and, at the same time, greater public participation in municipalities, with the aim of significantly improving service delivery and development to the people. As part of this overall approach, what can be done to improve IDPs?

There has to be greater clarity about the respective planning powers and functions of the three spheres of government. Some aspects of this can be addressed through clarity on policy and intergovernmental agreement and coordination on how to manage the overlaps; other aspects will require legislative changes; and yet other aspects may require that the Constitution be amended at some stage. In a way, the Constitutional Court’s decision, referred to earlier, to declare parts of the Development Facilitation Act unconstitutional has forced government’s hand, and the process of finalising a draft “Spatial Planning and Land Use Management Bill” has been speeded up. It is likely that the Bill will be taken to parliament in the second half of this year. It will certainly have to be finalised by parliament by the June 2012 deadline set by the Court. One tentative proposal being canvassed at the moment is for all three spheres to devise Spatial Development Frameworks. Certainly, the Court decision confirmed the legal status of SDFs (Spatial Development Frameworks) that are part of IDPs as a guide for land-use management and development at municipal level.

It is not yet clear exactly how the national development plan that is meant to be drafted by November this year will be implemented by the three spheres of government. But it will not work well unless all three spheres cooperate more effectively than they do at present. Obviously the Presidents Coordinating Council that is headed by the President and includes key national Ministers, the provincial premiers and local government leaders, will have to play a crucial role in its implementation, but so too will other intergovernmental structures. Civil society will have to be actively mobilized behind the national plan. Development planning is likely to be an important part of the national plan. More attention will have to be given to IDPs. Many aspects of the national plan, after all, will have to be implemented at local government level.
The financial cycles of the spheres of government may also have to be addressed. The financial year for the national and provincial government is from 1 April, while the financial year for local government is from 1 July. With these financial cycles being out of sync, intergovernmental coordination on development planning is made more difficult. It also limits the abilities of IDPs to influence and be influenced by intergovernmental transfers.

There is increasing consensus among a wide range of stakeholders, not least those who shaped the local government model, that there needs to be greater differentiation of municipalities within the three categories provided for in the Constitution, and consideration needs to be given to allocating them different powers and functions from the same menu, as it were, on the basis of their specific capacities, funding and other considerations. Of course a measure of differentiation is provided for in the current model in the way District and Local municipalities distribute powers and functions between them depending on their respective capacities and other considerations – but this is not enough. Basically we have too much of a “one-size-fits-all” approach - and it is not working well! There are proposals to consider providing for basic IDPs which all municipalities must do, but beyond this, those municipalities with greater capacity and more powers and functions, should do more comprehensive IDPs. All municipalities however must do at least a basic IDP.     

Generally IDPs need to be more active strategic instruments of development planning, not mechanical, arid, over-technical documents. As raised earlier, they have to be more focussed. “Focus is important in a municipality. Too many objectives diffuse impact“, notes a DPLG (2007) report. A former senior CoGTA official pointed out that “being holistic does not imply being comprehensive, which is what many IDPs tend to be. This leads to IDPs trying to address every sector equally, which is unrealistic and sets the municipality up for failure.”
He also says that “IDPs are not being used as a key socio-economic transformation tool. They are applied as a tool to often only address the basic needs of disadvantaged communities, but they are not being used to engage with the key levers of power to fundamentally address structural development impediments to economic growth and development at a local level. IDPs are not necessarily positioning municipalities and communities to manage urbanisation and rural dynamics.” 10

For IDPs to be effective there have to be more planners and others with the relevant technical skills trained. With the development of the new national development plan for the country, such scarce skills will be in greater demand. The Ministry of Higher Education and Training has to give this matter greater attention.
Obviously, many municipalities still have to use consultants to assist with IDPs because they do not have adequate in-house capacity. But there should be very clear terms on which consultants are used. They must act under the leadership of the councils and administrators within clear guidelines and frameworks and they must be fully conversant with the need of the municipality to engage with communities on the IDPs. Consultants should attend IDP meetings with  communities and engagements with stakeholder. They must also be required to assist with building in-house capacity on IDPs. Municipalities within a District could share consultants to reduce costs and ensure that while the IDPs are properly prepared they are also consistent with each other. 

For the IDPs to be credible and effective, active community participation is indispensable. But meaningful engagement with communities does not mean always agreeing with everything people say or demand. That would create unrealistic and unrealizable expectations. After all, there are competing needs even among the poor and disadvantaged that have to be mediated, taking into account limited resources. To convey the impression that the people know it all would be reckless populism that would cost the municipality as a whole, including the communities or strata within them always succumbed to, in the longer, if not shorter, term. If the demands of some groups, however deserving, are always met, others, usually just as deserving, if not more, lose out in conditions of limited resources. Better that specific communities are engaged with as openly as possible and their demands negotiated on as part of a process of meeting the demands of the residents of a municipality as a whole, particularly all those who are poor and disadvantaged. While officials can play an important part in encouraging community participation in IDPs, councillors have to take the lead.  

 
The government realises that it is crucial to have more empowered and effective Ward Committees and other forms of community participation. Among the proposals being considered to strengthen Ward Committees, for example, are the following:
    •    Ward Committees should more clearly represent a range of civil society stakeholders, such as local residents associations, and women, youth, cultural, religious, taxi, professional and other organizations, and not be over-run by political party activists.
    •    Wards covering a large geographical area should have area-based sub-structures of Ward Committees. These could include street, village and other sub-committees.
    •    More funding and other resources should be allocated to Ward Committees.
    •    Council should be obliged in law to seriously consider proposals from Ward Committees.
    •    Each Ward Committee should be allocated a Community Development Worker (CDW) to act as its “CEO”. (CDWs are paid by the state to link citizens with government departments to speed up delivery)
    •    Each Ward Committee should oversee the adoption of a Ward Development Plan that should feed into the IDP. Ward Committees should take responsibility for small projects within the Ward using local labour – for example, fixing potholes, pavements, street lights and the like. Ward Committees should also oversee bigger projects in the Ward.

Not all these and other proposals can be implemented overnight. It is not just about the budgetary and other resource constraints. Creating more space for Ward Committees such as proposed above will strengthen communities in some Wards, but in others it could lead to divisive and even debilitating contestation.  But this does not mean that the government should run away from its responsibilities to the people. It simply means that we have to be more sensitive, more adroit and wiser in how we relate to different communities in different wards. We can certainly do much more, while recognizing the difficulties, to encourage community participation. In any case, ultimately, we have no choice if we are serious about improving democracy, service delivery and development.

This may be a useful note to end on - for now. That for participatory planning to be significantly more effective, government and communities, while recognizing their distinct if interrelated roles, need to find new relationships and new ways of working with each other beyond the norms of conventional democracies. The more participatory planning works, the richer the quality of the democracy, and the deeper the democracy, the more participatory planning is likely to work. Maybe a more important measure of a democracy than we know is going to increasingly be how much effective participatory planning, especially in local government, there is in a country? And why not?

References
Binns T and Nel E (2002), Devolving Development: Integrated Development Planning and Developmental Local Government in Post-Apartheid South Africa, Regional Studies, Vol 36.8   
Carrim Y (2001), Bridging the Gap Between Theory and Practice: The Challenges of the New Local Government System, Umrabulo, Vol 10, May
Carrim Y (2009), Cooperative Governance, Service Delivery and Development, Speech at P&DM/The Weekender Lecture Series
Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs (2009), The State of Local Government in South Africa Report
CSIR (Council for Scientific and Industrial Research) (2003),Inter-governmental planning boosted by IDP Nerve Centre, Akani, November 2003
DPLG (Department of Provincial and local Government) (now Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs) (2005), IDP Hearings 2005: National Report
DPLG (2007), DPLG IDP Review: A Tale of Six Municipalities – Assessing the IDP-Municipal Operations and Capacity Link
Department of Constitutional Development and Provincial Affairs (1998) The White Paper on Local Government
Good Governance Learning Network (2008), Local democracy in Action: A Civil Society Perspective on Local Governance in South Africa, 
Harrison P (2008), The Origins and Outcomes of South Africa’s Integrated Development Plans, in Consolidating Developmental Local Government in South Africa: Lessons from the South African Experience  
Moodley S (2007) , Public participation and deeping democracy: experiences from Durban, South Africa, Journal on Public Participation in Governance, Vol.3 No.1
Patel Y and Powell D (2008), Intergovernmental Delivery in Municipal Areas: Reflections on Current Practice, Consolidating Developmental Local Government in South Africa: Lessons from the South African Experience.
van Donk M, Swilling M, Pieterse E and Parnell S (2008), Consolidating Developmental Local Government: Lessons from the South African Experience, UCT Press  
Legislation
1996,The Constitution of the Republic of South Africa, Act No. 108 of 1996
1998, Local Government: Municipal Structures Act,  Act No. 117 of 1998
2000, Local Government: Municipal Systems Act, Act No. 32 of 2000 
 

 


1 For a broad overview of the local government model in South Africa, see the White Paper (1998) and for a very basic political introduction, see Carrim (2001)

2 See Chapter 7 of the Constitution on Local Government and Schedules 4b and 5b, which set out the specific powers and functions of local government. Chapter 3 of the Constitution deals with cooperative government and intergovernmental relations and is also relevant

3 For an overview of the challenges in local government, see Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs (2009). Based on this report, the government adopted the Local Government Turnaround Strategy (LGTAS) to significantly improve the functioning of local government.
 


4 This section largely a repetition of a section of Carrim (2001)

5 See in particular Harrison (2008) and Binns and Nel (2002)

6 For a sense of some of the challenges of the model that warrant the review, see CoGTA (2009) and Carrim (2009)

7 This also emerged through the recent Constitutional Court decision that parts of a law - The Development Facilitation Act - are unconstitutional as they give provinces planning powers that belong to municipalities. The Court gave the legislature up till June 2012 to rectify this.

8 See CSIR (2003).

9 For an interesting and insightful participation process, see Moodley (2007)

10 Said by Yusuf Patel, former CoGTA official, in an exchange with the writer.