By Nkululeko Dunga
EFF Gauteng provincial chairperson
The Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) in Gauteng welcomes the successful tabling
and adoption of a historic motion by the EFF Tshwane Caucus in the Council of the
City of Tshwane Metropolitan Municipality to amend the Indigent Policy and the 100% scrapping of municipal debt for households deemed indigent.
Adopted with a decisive majority of 111 votes, this motion is a progressive victory for the poor and working-class residents of Tshwane, who can no longer be expected to bear the burden of rising municipal tariffs and unjust levies in an economy that continues to exclude them.
For far too long, indigent households have been trapped in a cycle of debt, not because of a refusal to pay, but because of a structural inability to afford basic services.
The EFF has correctly identified this crisis as a symptom of a broader fiscal design failure, where municipalities are underfunded and forced to extract revenue from those who have no means to pay.
This unjust system has punished the poor for the failures of the state.
The adopted motion to amend the Indigent Policy seeks to fundamentally transform
how the City responds to poverty by:
•Recognising households primarily dependent on social grants administered by the South African Social Security Agency (SASSA) as qualifying indigent households, subject to proper verification;
•Improving equitable access to free basic municipal services;
•Protecting vulnerable households from service disconnections; and
•Aligning indigent support with current socio-economic realities and
constitutional obligations.
The EFF has consistently rejected anti-poor fiscal policies, including those that seek to increase the cost of electricity and water under the false justification of ensuring municipal financial sustainability.
The working class must not be sacrificed to balance municipal books.
The EFF further maintains that social grants are not a form of income, but a minimal survival mechanism in a deeply unequal society.
Households dependent on these grants cannot and must not be expected to carry the burden of municipal service costs.
This motion lays the foundation for a transformative approach to governance in
Tshwane, one that places human dignity at its centre.
It is a decisive step towards ensuring that the elderly, persons with disabilities, child-headed households, and the unemployed are protected from the brutality of service disconnections and escalating debt.
The EFF reiterates its principled position that municipal debt owed by the poor must be scrapped in full.
This is not an act of charity, but a matter of justice.
No household should be criminalised for being poor, particularly when the government of the day has completely failed to provide jobs and improve living conditions.
In advancing this programme, the People’s Government in Tshwane will move to establish dedicated indigent household units within the Office of the Executive Mayor to ensure that qualifying households, particularly those dependent on social grants,receive free basic services without being subjected to exclusionary and bureaucratic registration systems.
The EFF calls on the City of Tshwane to implement this resolution as a matter of
urgency, with transparency and in an ethical manner.
The benefits of this policy must reach the people without delay or administrative barriers.
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