Participatory Planning and Budgeting

The single most relevent for people to get influcence in the functioning of the township is to be able to participate in (and hence influence) the planing and budgeting process, which is about allocation of resources across identified priorities.

Over the past decades, planning for public funds in general but also in townships was conducted by appointed government staff, mainly those located at the higher levels of government. Popular consultional were largely absent, but at the same time there were no discretional budgets at the lower levels of government to adress local priorities.
Ordinary people, as the beneficiaries of government services, are increasingly getting opportunity to get involved in the allocation of public funds at the lower levels of government ( such as, initially, through various development support committees at the township and tract level). At the same time, the township were getting some discretional funds in the from ogmf the consituency development fund, the now abolished poverty reduction fund and the resources generated by the municipal affairs department. In relatively however, projects for these funds are still decided upon in relatively small cricles.
For the township development grant it in proposed to make a radical change and have the participatorybplanning organized throung a representative democratic system as described above, whereby indirectly elected ward and tract leaders are expected to represent the views of the electorate. The grant is thus to s upport participatory planning and budgeting by making discretional process outlining the various ateps of the process; and by capacity development for the same.

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