BY MBONO MDLULI
MBABANE – Minister of Housing and Urban Development Apollo Maphalala has challenged governments of the country’s towns and cities (local governments) to come up with their own ways of making money, without burdening the ratepayers.
Minister Maphalala said such a move would go a long way in making the local governments to be sustainable. The minister said this during a meeting of the local governments, where they were reviewing the Rating Act of 1995 on February 19, 2025 in Manzini. The meeting was organised by the Ministry of Housing and Urban Development.
The Rating Act is reviewed because the Ministry feels as if it has to be relevant, as it was enacted before the country’s Constitution received Royal assent in 2005. Speaking during the meeting, the minister said it was important for urban government to have resource mobilisation offices, which would specialise in getting funding for the towns and cities.
Maphalala stated that such people would specialise on writing project proposals, studying funding patterns, and learn about trending patterns in the international financial space, so that they would know where to source funding to sustain the urban areas. The minister mentioned that Governments’ support to municipalities was dwindling, hence the need for such important offices.
The minister warned that burdening the ratepayers with the costs of running towns and cities would make the urban areas not sustainable. It would further make it difficult for the residents to continue living in such areas, as it would become unaffordable to do so. However, the minister acknowledged that Government needed to pay up owed rates to the country’s various towns and cities so that they could not find themselves having difficulties in meeting their expenses.
(Pics: Ministry of Housing and Urban Development, Eswatini)
