City Planning- Ekurhuleni, the Poorly Planned City

By Cllr Heather Hart- DA Shadow MMC for City Planning in Ekurhuleni

Date: 25 March 2025

Release: Immediate

A major hindrance to urban development and spatial planning in Ekurhuleni is the lack of bylaw enforcement, as well as the slow turnaround times within the Department of City Planning under the ANC-led coalition.

Central to the lack of by-law enforcement is the lack of human resources, specifically with building inspectors, building control officers and outdoor advertising inspectors due to insufficient funded positions available. As a result, there is a general lack of accountability across the Department as contravention notices are issued and ignored while legal services fail to prosecute the offending parties — while blaming lack of evidence or lack of sufficient proof of delivery notices. This equates to poor service standards across the built environment and ultimately negatively affecting service delivery to residents.

The slow turnaround time around development facilitation is also problematic as process flow and implementation remains painstakingly slow. Former Executive Mayor, Mondli Gungubele, committed to a 40-day turnaround during his term in office. Under the current ANC coalition-led administration, however, this promise has long been forgotten due to increasing inefficiencies within the Department. As a result, councillors are called upon to assist in administrative processes. Recent determinations by the Metro, however, which prohibit officials from engaging with councillors (unless prior permission from the MMC is obtained), have severely restricted process flow required for effective implementation.

The slow turnaround time and the lack of implementation, synonymous with the ANC coalition-led administration, is endemic in the Department and has led to an increase of illegal land use, the proliferation of illegal outdoor advertising and massive urban decay.

A DA-run City of Ekurhuleni will:

· Establish the required municipal law enforcement capacity to enable our City to create and enforce by-laws;

· Establish municipal courts to enforce traffic regulations and by-law infringements, thus improving the rule of law and reducing the burden on the courts;

· Implement a live tracking system of enforcement notices and their prosecution;

· Reduce Red Tape- Simplify regulations, especially those relating to zoning, planning approvals, health and safety, traffic and licensing.

Cllr. Heather Hart

DA Shadow MMC for City Planning in Ekurhuleni