The Ekurhuleni Metro’s petition system, which is meant to serve as residents’ formal channel to voice service delivery problems, is nothing but a box-ticking exercise in practice.
Hundreds of residents are awaiting responses and action, while their petitions fall through the system’s cracks.
The latest ward committee report for the fourth quarter (April to June) confirms this failure. Service delivery issues were reported in large numbers, but there are no progress reports or responses.
Even the Metro’s own performance information serves as an acknowledgement of the decline, seeing as the public participation and petition process recorded its lowest average performance in five years – only 30%.
The statistics are shocking. During the 2025/26 financial year, 275 petitions were submitted. Only 26 were resolved, while 249 remain outstanding and have simply been added to the backlog from previous years.
A petition is not meant to be a piece of paper that disappears into a file. It is one of the most important mechanisms at residents’ disposal to formally request solutions to unresolved service delivery issues.
Residents take time and effort to report issues via ward committees, public meetings and formal petitions. They have the right to know what is being done about those issues.
The Freedom Front Plus believes that after the local government elections, the new Council should fundamentally reform the management of petitions.
Every petition must be trackable from submission to finalisation, with clear turnaround times, regular feedback to committees or individuals, and actual accountability when departments simply fail to respond, as is currently the case.
Public participation does not end when a resident signs a petition. On the contrary, it is only the beginning of a process meant to deliver tangible results.
