Now for action on service delivery

IN the budget he delivered on Wednesday, Finance Minister Nhlanhla Nene made a bold and important intervention on behalf of South Africa’s citizens: poorly run municipalities have been given less money to spend.

They will receive enough to cover basic services such as water and electricity, but there are conditions attached to these grants.

With this step, Nene has demonstrated that he has not been sleeping while people across South Africa have been waging a dogged and often destructive war against bad service delivery.

Putting the onus on municipalities to prove that they can spend the funds effectively means he has also taken the findings of the auditor-general seriously. Last year, Thembekile Makwetu reported that government entities had wasted more than R2-billion in 2013 — despite an improvement in audit outcomes. And there was another R26.4-billion of irregular spending.

There is often applause when finance ministers announce a big slice for education and health. And this year is no different. Nene announced generous allocations to health — to reach R178-billion by 2017-18 — and education, which is to get R640-billion over the next three years. A sizeable portion of this will go towards bursaries and teacher training.

I doubt that any reasonable person would resist any plan to boost expenditure on health and education services.

But it is also time for some introspection.

In 2013, education once again received the biggest slice — R232.5-billion — of the country’s R1.06-trillion budget.

Africa Check reported that in 2007, South Africa was spending $1 225 per pupil in primary school — more than most African countries. To put this figure into perspective, the independent fact-checking organisation compared us with Kenya, a country whose economy is now the ninthlargest on the continent. Then, Kenya spent only $258 on primary education per pupil, but performed much better than South Africa in reading and mathematics. The situation has not changed.

And although there has been a marked reduction in child mortality in the past five years, our health system, minister Dr Aaron Motsoaledi has acknowledged, is still below par. In 2011, total spend on health was R248.6-billion — or around 8.3% of GDP, way above the 5% recommended by the World Health Organisation. However, this was slightly lower than the 8.51% of GDP spent on health in 2009, the World Bank reported.

It seems that a lack of resources is not a satisfactory explanation for the severe problems that millions of citizens encounter when they send their children to school or try to get healthcare from the public sector.

If bureaucracy and poor planning are to blame, then these are man-made problems that must be attended to urgently. If it is a lack, or unequal distribution, of expertise, then we must train more professionals — and they must come from these most bereft of communities.

Few professionals want to go to these areas of the country because the communities have been neglected and treated like South Africa’s poor cousins.

But this budget means nothing without the political will to take action and an unwavering commitment to high standards of delivery.