Want to earn R19,000 per month? Apply to become a general worker at the Emfuleni Local Municipality (ELM).

This is one of the reasons organised business has urged that ELM immediately halt its recruitment drive, launched in December last year, amidst a worsening revenue crisis and failure to pay service providers, reports Vaal Weekblad.

But ELM Spokesperson, Stan Gaba, said the move was in response to ongoing personnel attrition at ELM. He did not comment on exorbitant salaries advertised for unskilled workers, but seemed to recognise poor management and “lack of resources” to manage personnel properly.

The Golden Triangle Chamber of Commerce (GTCoC) said it opposed the recruitment drive as it was simply unaffordable for a cash-strapped ELM, and the additional financial burden would also derail the municipality’s own Financial Recovery Plan (FRP).

“ELM simply cannot afford to take on new employees – full stop! ELM is already in desperate financial strains and cannot even manage existing employees effectively in the first place,” said GTCoC CEO, Klippies Kritzinger.

Kritzinger has subsequently called for an immediate moratorium on further recruitment.

ELM was confronted with massive revenue-flow challenges in 2019 due in part to the destruction by ELM management of the smart meter programme – leading to losses estimated at above R100 million. The embattled municipality was also confronted by a threatened Eskom blackout due to non-payment.

The GTCoC and Large Power Users (LPU’s) also mounted a court challenge to ELM’s exorbitant power tariff hikes and gained a court order rescinding the price increases – gained belatedly and under false pretences by ELM from energy regulator Nersa in the first place.

“ELM is already diverting national grant funding illegally to pay its R120 million per month salary bill,” informed political sources told Mooivaal Media.

Gaba commented as follows on the recruitment: “The current positions the municipality is filling are mainly replacement positions where employees have resigned, passed on, dismissed for misconduct, promotions and contracts lapsing.

“Note that the municipality has for the past four financial years not filled positions commensurate with the terminations which adversely affects the provision of basic services.

“With regards to poor performance there are a number of influencing factors, ranging from ill-discipline, lack of proper supervision [which the municipality is putting systems in place to combat] and lack of resources to execute these functions owing to the financial position of the municipality,” said Gaba.

“ELM has to this date still not put together an effective top management structure headed by a permanent Municipal Manager to address administration effectively,” said Kritzinger.

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