During a recent council meeting of the Rustenburg Local Municipality (RLM), the FF Plus strongly opposed the intended incorporation of, among others, the Kgetlengrivier Local Municipality (Koster, Derby and Swartruggens) as well as a part of the Madibeng Local Municipality (Brits, Hartbeespoort and Mooinooi) into the RLM.
The FF Plus is the only party that opposed this.
The Municipal Demarcation Board (MDB) has in the meantime confirmed that the preparations for incorporating these municipal areas into the RLM have already progressed quite far.
Incorporating Kgetlengrivier and the other municipal areas into the RLM will not benefit any of the affected residents.
Residents of the RLM, Kgetlengrivier and Madibeng have been plagued by the negative consequences of the ANC's mismanagement and corruption in these municipalities for years.
The shocking decay of basic infrastructure and poor service delivery in Rustenburg, Koster, Derby, Swartruggens, Brits and Mooinooi speak for itself.
Centralising the mismanagement and corruption will simply exacerbate these service delivery problems.
Incorporating these municipal areas into the RLM also appears to be a cynical attempt by the ANC to gain an absolute majority in the RLM municipal council.
At present, the ANC can only govern this Municipality with the support of smaller parties.
Increasing the RLM's jurisdiction in this way and the consequent increase in the number of residents could result in the RLM being declared a metropolis.
That would bring about a substantive increase in the salaries of councillors in the municipal council.
This may be the reason why the other opposition parties in the council are in favour of the amalgamation, despite the apparent disadvantages for residents.
This step also demonstrates that the ANC government is solely focused on furthering the interests of the party and its cadres at the expense of residents.
In light of the failure of, for example, the amalgamation of the contiguous Ventersdorp and Potchefstroom municipal areas to form the JB Marks Local Municipality, it is a disgrace that the ANC is determined to proceed with its plan.
The amalgamation merely resulted in corruption increasing hand over fist. And residents of JB Marks have since experienced severe decline in service delivery.
Substantive capital investments were looted in the process and critical infrastructure has decayed due to mismanagement.
Instead of finding solutions that will benefit the country's citizens, the ANC government seems to be determined to cling to any form of power and create new corruption channels for its cadres.
Incorporating Kgetlengrivier and the other municipal areas into the RLM comes down to the centralisation of corruption and mismanagement at the expense of residents.
The FF Plus will keep fighting against such irregularities and the abuse of power in ANC-controlled municipalities in the North West.
The residents of Rustenburg, Kgetlengrivier and Madibeng deserve better than the ANC.
