South Africa

JOHANNESBURG – Training municipalities to manage their finances will bring better service delivery, Higher Education and Training Minister Blade Nzimande says. "Enhanced municipal service delivery, along with cleaner municipal administration... is perhaps ambitious, but critically necessary," he adds. "The expectations of communities have been raised by the state, but not always met." He says that financial management is a key skill in local government and is clearly not up to standard. Only seven of 237 municipalities had obtained unqualified audits for the past financial year. "We are looking for ambassadors and change agents to turn this around," the minister says. The department launched a skills programme to upgrade financial skills at municipalities. Its aim is to introduce minimum standards of competence for supply chain and financial managers. These minimum standards are in accordance with National Treasury regulations to be put into effect in January 2013. National Treasury Accountant General Freeman Nomvalo says that such rules and regulations are needed to fight unacceptable levels of fraud and corruption in the government. "It is clear that the extent of fraud and corruption is threatening our democracy. We will be holding officials accountable to let them answer to what they have or have not done," he says. He says that a recent report by the Auditor General shows that municipalities are failing in their duties because of a lack of leadership and required skills.

MIDRAND – Economic Development Minister Ebrahim Patel has urged business to approach his department with key projects that are currently being delayed as a result of red tape, or a lack of infrastructure. Speaking at a Gauteng investor conference, he says that a Ministerial team has been established to overcome blockages to major private sector investments and programmes. “We will focus on unblocking as many of these projects as possible,” Patel avers. In addition, the newly established Presidential Infrastructure Coordinating Commission would seek to drive public investment initiatives, “speed up decision-making and delivery and develop a ten-year project pipeline”. “Government has committed to increasing investment in infrastructure and people, which are necessary to support private sector investment and to provide opportunities for our people,” he says, adding that fast-growing economies have typically had investment levels of at least 25% of gross domestic product over a sustained period. In a separate response to a Parliamentary question on the mechanisms being put in place between the government and the private sector to ensure job creation, Patel reports that State-owned enterprises (SoEs) have been requested to take into account sustainable job creation potential of user companies when committing resources to infrastructure developments. “For example, when a new rail line can unlock additional mining jobs in an area, the SoE will be encouraged to fast-track finalisation of its plans,” he says.

JOHANNESBURG – South Africa ranks fifth overall in the 2011 Ibrahim Index of governance quality in Africa, but fares poorly in the area of personal safety, the latest index shows. South Africa’s national security scores a high of 95 out of 100 on the index, but only 25 for personal safety. South Africa’s score for personal safety is lower than the score for Algeria (44), Angola (36), Egypt (49), Libya (39), Rwanda (40) and Swaziland (40), the index shows. Foundation board member Hadeel Ibrahim says that countries with a high national security score do not have civil or external wars. But the personal safety score brings into question whether it is safe to walk at night without being raped or robbed. The two categories make a clear distinction between political instability and personal safety. The study, which uses 86 indicators to measure the effective delivery of public goods and services to African citizens, gives South Africa 71 points out of 100 for governance quality. This is higher than the regional average of 58 and the continental average of 50. South Africa ranks fourth on the rule of law, fifth when it comes to accountability, third in the area of human rights, and seventh with regard to sustainable economic opportunity. It does well in the sphere of public management, ranking first, is fourth when it comes to business environment, eleventh in the field of infrastructure, and fourteenth in the rural sector. South Africa’s overall ranking is behind Mauritius, Cape Verde, Botswana and the Seychelles. Somalia has the lowest ranking. Foundation chairperson Mo Ibrahim (pictured) says a trend to watch is that countries are showing a reversal of citizens’ rights and human rights in favour of economic sustainability.

DURBAN – Global climate change negotiators have concluded their last round of discussions before next month’s UN convention in Durban, where South Africa has a faint hope of extending the Kyoto Protocol beyond next year. But, while negotiators see no chance for a sweeping deal to control greenhouse-gas emissions, they say that the talks could yet lay the groundwork for a binding climate deal that could include the world’s largest greenhouse-gas emitters – China and the US. “Governments are really committed to starting a process toward that (new pact) and that includes the United States and China,” Christiana Figueres, the executive secretary of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change, or UNFCCC, says. “How they will get there, with what speed they will be able to get there – that still remains to be seen,” she says. The 1997 Kyoto Protocol, a global pact to curb greenhouse gasses, ends next year. Kyoto was meant to stem climate change but obliged only developed nations to reduce emissions. The US never signed the deal and developing nations have since become major emitters. Nations including Russia, Canada and Japan say they will not sign on for another commitment period when the current one expires. The European Union (EU) is the only major emitter that has expressed a willingness to continue its commitment to Kyoto, but EU negotiators say there is no point in signing a global agreement that would only cover around 15% of emissions. The US is still unlikely to sign any agreement and major emerging nations want assurance that a UNFCCC agreement on green finance is in place before committing themselves to a binding agreement, negotiators say.

Africa & the world

TUNIS – By 2060 three quarters of Africa's 2-billion-plus people will be living in cities and most countries will be "upper middle income", but economic growth will still lag Asia's, the African Development Bank (AfDB) says. The bank says in a report that under a best-case scenario African output will rise to $15-trillion in the next 50 years from $1.7-trillion now. That projection, based on continent-wide average growth rates of 6% or more, will imply a trebling in annual per capita income to $5 600, the Tunis-based bank says, underscoring the attraction of Africa's largely untapped commercial markets. Its worst-case view, based on annual growth of closer to 5% – similar to current levels of expansion – still resulted in average personal income of $5 000. Such figures are impressive when stacked up alongside the anaemic projections being hammered out for developed economies but look pedestrian compared with the nearly 10% growth rates charted for the likes of China, India or Southeast Asia. "While in recent years African growth rates have exceeded those of the world as a whole, they remain lower than in Asia's developing economies and this is unlikely to change in the coming decades," the report says. Much of Africa's pacy growth since the millennium has been based on market liberalisation, high commodity prices and the spread of technologies like the mobile phone. However in coming decades it is more likely to be driven by industrialisation and the swelling ranks of its urban workers.

YAOUNDE – Cameroonian political parties have launched around 12 lawsuits calling for all or part of a presidential election to be annulled because of what they call widespread fraud, court officials say. Incumbent president Paul Biya is widely expected to be re-elected in the poll, contested by more than 20 rivals from the splintered opposition. "Sunday's poll was marred by massive fraud, numerous irregularities, conscience buying, and the very low turnout, among the many lapses," says Jean Jacques Ekindi, presidential candidate for the minor Progressive Movement party, who has asked Cameroon's Supreme Court to annul the whole vote. A court official says he has received 12 lawsuits and is expecting more, many of alleging irregularities by the elections organiser ELECAM, which opposition parties say is controlled by the government. International election observers have praised the peaceful conduct of the vote but have raised concerns over the electoral process. The Commonwealth observer mission, in its preliminary findings, says that the use of state resources in Biya's campaign "challenged the notion of a level playing field". Biya, 78, acknowledged there may have been "imperfections" in the staging of the election, but denies fraud.

MOGADISHU – African peacekeepers and Somali government forces have flushed Islamist rebels out of one of the few pockets of the capital, Mogadishu, still under militant control, a spokesperson for the peacekeeping force says. Residents say artillery shells from both sides rained down on Huriwa, one of two suburbs in north Mogadishu where the United Nations-backed government exercises no control. “We captured Huriwa district after a joint operation by the government and Amisom (the peacekeeping African Union Mission for Somalia) this morning,” Paddy Ankunda, a spokesperson for the African Union force, says. “We want to push al-Shabaab to an area out of mortar range . . . so that their mortars cannot reach Mogadishu residents,” he says. Some residents say enclaves within Huriwa remain in the hands of the rebels, but that most are under government control. The latest wave of fighting in Huriwa and parts of nearby Kaaraan district follows sustained shelling by the rebels in the area last week that killed ten civilians, Amisom says.