In his weekly newsletter, President Cyril Ramaphosa wrote: “When people are deprived of the basic services without proper explanation of why this has happened or how it is being fixed, it erodes public confidence in local government.”

The SA local government elections are set to take place on November 1. We are seeing political parties campaigning to convince and win over voters and launching their election manifestos.

While promises of efficient and effective service delivery were made, it remains to be seen if communities were convinced. Although government has made important improvements regarding more equality within society, service delivery remains a huge challenge for most municipalities.

We have seen an increase in community protests over the years despite countless promises made by different political leaders. According to the SA Police Service (SAPS) Incident Registration Information System (IRIS), a total of 909 protest actions took place from August 1 2020 to January 31 2021.

This is a very important time, especially for our local government. It is an opportunity for us to choose who we want and trust to deliver on our needs as communities and to hold accountable those responsible for the poor service delivery.

Judging by the surge of local community protests, do the governing parties of the 257 municipalities deserve a second chance, have they done enough to retain or win over new voters? For the voters, will it be a case of better the devil you know than the one you don’t?  It will be interesting to see.

Zamansele Machate, Pretoria