MEDIA STATEMENT BY THE
INKATHA
FREEDOM PARTY
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26 NOVEMBER – 2 DECEMBER 2007 Dear residents of KwaZulu Natal In all my years in the struggle against apartheid, in the government of KwaZulu Natal and now in opposition, I have been fascinated by the ANC’s seemingly limitless verbal acrobatics. Lately, the buzz word has been a “strong local government”. In the face of all evidence that points to the ruling party’s obsession with centralisation of power at national level, the ANC is very vocal on the subject of a strong local government. The strong local government argument was even used in the debate about the controversial 13th Constitutional Amendment Bill which relegates Matatiele into the Eastern Cape against the wishes of its residents. Let me explain what they really mean. The ANC is determined to throw Matatiele to the wolves in the Eastern Cape, somehow hoping that a strong local government will arrest the inevitable decline in service delivery in the much poorer province. We in the Official Opposition are left to wonder how such a staunch advocate of a strong local government as the ANC-controlled provincial government can ignore representatives of the local government at every turn. And, believe me, it does. None other than the ANC’s eThekwini Secretary-General John Mchunu has recently voiced the frequent concern that “the office of the Premier goes to areas without consulting the municipality and the locals”. The IFP has complained that the ANC-controlled provincial government routinely fails to consult with IFP-run municipalities ahead of all shared activities – from festive functions to developmental projects. Now it appears that the government and the Premier are equally contemptuous of the municipalities controlled by their own party. The IFP maintains that this unhelpful attitude towards the local government in KwaZulu Natal does not only contradict the ruling party’s own rhetoric, but is also in stark contrast to the close co-operation between the IFP-run provincial government and municipalities between 1994 and 2004.
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