Volume 9, Issue 2, April/May 2007

A lot of talk and discussion documents have been making the rounds in the past two or three years about the imminent restructuring of the state machinery and the review of provinces. Yet little or nothing is said about the inevitable question: What is the future of district municipalities?

This judgment considered the constitutional dimension of town planning schemes and zoning. Which sphere of government has jurisdiction to determine land use applications and to amend zoning schemes?

Gauteng is claimed to be a "global city region". What does this mean? The City region refers to an area comprised of more than city or urban node- a metropolitan region. The term "global" refers to a city region which is connected in a series of networks with the global economy. As a global economic hub, a city region competes with other global economic hubs for capital and resources. The question is then, how can the region compete more effectively with other global city regions.

As far back as 1986, the President of Cameroon acknowledged the need to introduce decentralisation in order to make the people aware of their responsibilities and develop their sense of participation. Little was implemented in this regard until the end of the century. Even the emergence of an opposition movement st the end of the Cold War resulted in no more than gradual changes.

The recently launched DPLG Framework for an integrated Local Government Response to HIV and AIDS comments that local government has an "enormous responsibility to respond to the challenge of HIV and AIDS", not only as an employer but also by dealing with the impacts of the epidemic at a community level.

Over the past few years, municipalities have become acquainted with the three key instruments for strategic management. First, the integrated development plan (IDP) sets out the municipality's key priorities and objectives for the medium and long term. Second, the IDP is implemented through the municipal budget, which allocates resources to the priorities of the IDP for the financial year and two years thereafter. Third, the municipality monitors its performance on the priorities objectives of the IDP through its performance management system. So where does the the service delivery and budget implementation plan (SDBIP) fit in? The introduction of another instrument accompanied by procedures and legal requirements can easily make local government practitioners sceptical or obsessed with compliance. This article makes a case foR viewing the SDBIP from a common-sense perspectives rather than a legal-compliance perspective only.