Number of shack dwellers on the rise in city with highest paid manager
The municipality with the highest paid city manager in the country surprisingly has seen a rise in the number of people living in informal settlements and in those not enjoying piped water.
Jason Ngobeni‚ the city manager in Tshwane‚ took the trophy as the highest paid public official in the country‚ according to a parliamentary report.
Ngobeni earns R3-million — way more than cabinet ministers — in a city that has had a lot of problems with its administration whose term of office ends in August.
According to the Statistics SA Community Survey 2016 released last week‚ the City of Tshwane has 3.2 million people‚ up from the 2.9 million recorded in the national census in 2011.
The number of households living in formal housing in Tshwane stands at 939‚307. Households still living in traditional housing structures number about 3‚500. However‚ the number of households who live in informal settlement has increased from 164‚014 in 2011 to 186‚862 in 2016.
In total‚ there are one million people enjoying piped water in Tshwane. But the number of people with no access to piped water has surged from 31‚095 to 93‚968 under Ngobeni’s management.
The City of Tshwane is also experiencing population growth. The number of people living within the city’s borders has increased from 2.9 million to 3.2 million in the past five years.
The 2014/15 salaries of almost all of the country’s municipal managers were revealed in a response by the Department of Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs (Cogta) to a parliamentary question by the Democratic Alliance’s Nomsa Marchesi.
Ngobeni was appointed to the post in 2011 and‚ even then‚ was out-earning the president. Officials at the time said that a favourable salary package needed to be offered in a bid to secure and retain him in the position.
Other metro municipal manager salaries range between R1.9-million for Buffalo City and R2.8 million for Ekhuruleni. The eThekwini and Mangaung municipal managers’ packages are on par at around R2.4 million each while the City of Cape Town municipal manager earns just over R2.2 million. The Johannesburg municipal manager takes home R2.6 million annually.