SIMBA RUSHWAYA

JOHANNESBURG – The mayor of the City of Johannesburg Mpho Parks Tau, recently delivered the crucial State of the City Address which generally points the direction the city is taking socially and economically. Gauteng Guardian picks some of the major highlights;
-R14 billion worth of investment has flowed into the Inner City through the Urban Development Zone tax incentive.
-Over the last five years, the city has upgraded nearly 30 000 informal homes
-Johannesburg has reduced food insecurity for over 66 000 people.
– Jozi is South Africa’s number one metro when it comes to financial
management – recognising the successful implementation of our Financial
Development Plan

-Soweto of 2016 boasts tarred roads, a world class theatre, extensive public transport networks, and some of the City’s best parks and retail, tourism and entertainment centres.
-The city is developing quality, integrated housing in Fleurhof, South Hills, Lufhereng Riverside and Malibongwe Ridge adding to successes in areas such as Lehae, Cosmo City and the Golden Triangle – easily the most ambitious mixed-income housing project. These new mega-projects have a yield of almost 70 000 units.
-Joburg has done a comprehensive audit of 181 informal settlements, and they house 168 000 households, the vast majority of whom have access to basic water and sanitation.
– Announced a far-sighted partnership with the Harambee youth employment accelerator, known as the Vulindlel’ eJozi programme, which has already registered over 127 000 young people, of the targeted 200 000 announced last year.
-The Massive Open Online Varsity – or MOOV initiative – which is at the heart of the Vulindlel’ eJozi programme – is already opening up opportunities for 4 000 young Joburgers. MOOV uses state-of-the-art, video enabled, learning – to turn our libraries and community centres into online universities and technical schools.
-Jozi has directly supported and assisted over 24 000 small- and medium- sized enterprises so far.
-In partnership with Wits University, the city has created a Research Chair in Economic Development and attracted one of the world’s leading investment experts to fill this position. This will support the City through a research agenda which analyses opportunities and monitors performance.
-Over 1 100km of broadband and Fibre-optic cable is in place. This is becoming the backbone of the MOOV system, of high-speed internet access in local libraries, e-health systems and of the command centres which use information from CCTV cameras to make the streets of Joburg safer.
-Connected 66 of our 87 local libraries citywide to high-speed internet, provided at no cost to the public in areas such as Orange Farm, Lenasia, Diepsloot, Randburg, Westbury, Emmarentia, Cosmo City, Ennerdale, Florida, Roodepoort and all across Soweto.
-The City, in support of the Louis-Botha corridor, is currently implementing the third phase of the Rea Vaya system extending it to Alexandra, Sandton, Midrand, Ivory Park and Randburg. This will include
three new iconic bridges over the M1, two dedicated for walking and cyclists and the third for Rea Vaya.
-Built a new bridge linking Naledi with Protea North and the new Le Roux Bridge in Midrand, along with the new wider Coleraine Bridge in Bryanston. Jozi will soon be building the new Jabulani Bridge and the Conrad Drive Bridge in Randburg.
-A total of 930 Traffic Signal Control instruments have been replaced.
-Have spent more than R30-billion on improving this city’s infrastructure. This is part of a R100-billion capital commitment over 10 years.
-99.4% of citizens have access to water, and 94.5% have access to basic sanitation. The investment has been on water networks, sewer networks, storage capacity and treatment capacity. The focus has been on improving service to marginalised areas including Soweto, Ivory Park, Orange Farm, Diepsloot and Alexandra. The drinking water quality remained above the national standard of 99% and Joburg retained the Blue Drop Certification for the three years it was assessed.
-Johannesburg has, over the last five years, rehabilitated over 140 km of roads and resurfaced almost 2 500 lane kilometres– significantly reducing the incidence of potholes. Over the past year alone Jozi reduced the length of gravel roads by 40% through our asphalt programme.
-Almost 75 000 solar water heaters were installed in a number of areas including Devland, Lawley, Vlakfontein, Eldorado Park, Lenasia, Alexandra and Lehae.
-Established 28 local drug action committees, which are implementing local awareness campaigns. Joburg facilitates therapy and rehabilitation at city centre in Roodepoort, and through networks of non-governmental and faith-based organizations.
The city has registered significant decline in crimes such as common assault, theft of motor vehicles, burglaries and residential crimes. In 2014/15 alone, a reduction of 22% happened in actual incidents of crime.
-Introduced new electronic patient record system, which will be installed in 15 clinics across Soweto by June. This will significantly reduce waiting times to an average of 10 minutes per person, freeing the health care professionals to provide an improved service.
-More than 99% of HIV exposed babies born in Johannesburg were born HIV negative in the 2014/15 financial year and 96% of fixed clinics offer Anti-Retroviral Treatment.
-The city achieved 100% immunisation coverage for children under One-year-old – particularly for pneumonia and diarrhoeal diseases.
-The GoJozi healthy lifestyle programme has gone a long way in promoting better ways to eat and exercise. Through the Jozi Vitality Schools Programme, the city is directly influencing how schools promote and enable healthier habits. To this end it has enrolled 157 schools across the City.
-The City’s Financial Development Plan, adopted in 2012, has delivered positive results – liquidity improvement of 41.5% over the first two years from R2.2bn to R5.2bn. There has been a growth in Opex budget from R29bn per year to R43bn per year and a growth in Capex from R3.7bn to R10.1 bn.

-Established the Office of the Ombudsman with sweeping powers to investigate administrative weaknesses and failures, and make recommendations on remedies.
Since its opening, the office the Ombudsman has received more than 1 500 inquiries from residents and business people and some 600 of these have matured into actual cases.