In a bid to fight poverty, the Democratic Alliance (DA)-run Umngeni municipality outside Pietermaritzburg, which is predominantly rural, has written off R10 million worth of debts owed by poor and struggling households, said Mayor Chris Pappas.

Pappas said there are 3 190 households that would benefit from the municipality’s debt write-offs. 

He said such families would receive free electricity, while their children would be assisted with short-term employment. 

He said debts vary as some families owe as little as R61 but end up accumulating more in their accounts, while others are in serious trouble as they owe up to R90 000, which they do not know how to settle.

According to the municipality’s 2025-2026 Integrated Development Plan, youth unemployment among young people aged between 25 and 34 years is at 36.2%.

“It depends on what people have not been paying, but that has now been written off,” he said. 

He said families classified as indigents have the largest debts.

“We then ask them to go (to the municipality) to verify if they are, in fact, in an adverse situation, we curate their details, and we give them free basic electricity.

“We give people 200 kilowatt-hours,” he said.

He said it has been proven that free basic services were able to help deserving families come out of poverty.  

He said the municipality has been monitoring the state of poverty and identified those who really need help. 

He said the municipality has established that there were households headed by elderly men with no support from their families.

“One of the common things that we see are elderly gentlemen who have no one to look after them as they have no grandchildren, no wives, or anyone,” said Pappas.

The areas that have households to benefit from the debt write-offs include Mpophomeni Township. 

He said elderly men were the most vulnerable group because no one pays attention to their situation.

“They are sort of repeating on our system, and when we identify those people, we make sure to assist them by making sure that they are not accumulating debts, not getting blacklisted, and that they are not followed by debt collectors or having their electricity cut off,” he said. 

Pappas said the municipality was working on establishing the common driver of poverty.

“We don’t want people to get free basic services forever, but we want people to get to a situation where they are no longer poor,” he said. 

He said families who have stayed in free basic services for many years were being prioritised for the short-term, such as through the Expanded Public Works Programme (EPWP), including fixing the roads, electricity maintenance, and providing community security programmes and maintaining tourism sites. 

He said such projects aimed at attracting business to invest in the small farming and tourism town.

“We are excited that over the last three years, youth unemployment has decreased by seven percent, meaning that there is something we are doing right. 

“Those young people who are being employed support their households. It is not necessarily a good thing that people have free basic services, but it just means that we have a high level of poverty. So we want to have a low level of poverty,” he said.

Pappas said another way of fighting poverty was through agriculture by creating a mindset within small-scale farmers that they were actually businesspeople. 

“We partner with them to make sure that their businesses are successful as opposed to just dependent on government,” he said.

He said, besides making tractors, which were recently purchased at the cost of R1.2 million, available to small-scale farmers, the municipality was going out to teach people how to handle foot and mouth disease, which ravaged many parts of the country.

“A lot of it is about education, and making sure that people understand animal health and the legislation. 

“Local people don’t brand their cattle anymore, and there is no animal identification, which makes it hard to sell them at market. Those are basic things to show that small-scale farmers are actually businesspeople, and they can be treated like that in a formal economy,” he said. 

He said tractors were kept in the municipality facility and provided to farmers on request. 

When challenged that such programmes were part of DA’s campaign for the local government elections, he said the debt write off have been taking place for the past three years.

“It is just that the biggest write-off was this year because we managed to improve the system of identifying poor households. 

“The closer we get to the local government elections, the more people would say we are only doing things for elections.

“We are not going to stop working because the elections are coming, and there will be more programmes that we will roll out because the elections will come and go,” Pappas said.

 ANC in the Moses Mabhida Region, which incorporates the Umngeni municipality, said it was surprised by the DA’s positive move to help the poor.

The ANC in the Moses Mabhida Region, which incorporates the Umngeni municipality, welcomed the move, which it said was unlike the DA to do things for the poor. 

“Let us give credit where it is due because, whether it is for electioneering or not, they are allowed to do so,” ANC regional coordinator Zet Luzipho said.

However, the writing-off debts was unlike the DA, which he said did not have a policy that looked after the indigents. 

“Everyone in South Africa knows that the indigent policy is an ANC policy. 

“The DA has a principle of user pays, and they don’t have a principle that says you can get free services, as they are a liberal party of which liberalism does not allow people to get something for free. 

“They are doing this for elections, although I know that they will deny it,” he said. 

He said if the municipality was serious about supporting small-scale farmers, it must first address the issue of property ownership.

“How do you give tractors to small-scale farmers without defining who they are they. Have they allowed farm tenants, dwellers, and workers to become permanent residents on those farms?” said Luzipho.  

bongani.hans@inl.co.za

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