SERVICE delivery levels and the quality of services have slumped this year while the number of recorded service delivery protests have hit an all-time high.

In 2008, only 27 major protests were recorded, but the number has shot up to 107 this year. This is slightly higher than last year's 105 recorded protests.

The figures are provided by Municipal IQ, a specialised local government data and intelligence service.

Municipalities were rated according to poverty levels and the municipal response to poverty; access to a minimum level of municipal services; infrastructure used by residents to participate in the economy; financial governance and expenditure levels by a local council; and vacancy rates in a municipality.

Protests in municipalities and wards were tracked since 2004.

Municipal IQ managing director Kevin Allan said: "The recession has fed through into this year's MPI results, partly due to diminished spending by municipalities and shrinking revenue bases."

Western Cape municipalities are outperforming other provinces, followed by Gauteng. The Eastern Cape and KwaZulu-Natal are in eighth and ninth place, respectively.

Municipal IQ economist Karen Heese said: "It is a depressing reality that provinces that are rural and were home to former homelands continue to languish, with poor revenue streams and a dearth of capacity undermining municipalities' ability to deliver much-needed services."

Johannesburg is rated South Africa's best performing metropolitan, followed by Cape Town and eThekwini.

Nine of 10 top-performing local municipalities are in the Western Cape, while Eastern Cape and KwaZulu-Natal municipalities dominate the bottom scoring portion of the Index.

Heese said, "It is interesting that the top-rated provinces on the MPI, the Western Cape and Gauteng, are also the most protest afflicted. These provinces are home to some of South Africa's largest metropolitan municipalities, where more than half of this year's protests have taken place."

South African Local Government Association (Salga) executive director of strategy, policy and research Seana Nkhahle said the root causes of protests were not always service delivery related.

"We prefer to call them community protests. The biggest problem is effective communication between the municipality and community. There is a lack of feedback on projects and problems. We are working to fix this."

He said other factors like internal and external party politics and rivalry for local government positions were behind many protests.