Bodorpe en onderdorpe: the local government challenge

By Maeder Osler

Toverview continues to take a close look at the level of government that is meant to be closest to the people,  namely local government. This is because, despite the advent of democracy some 30 years ago, we still have bodorpe and onderdorpe – areas of greater and lesser privilege – in almost every town in the country.

This has been apparent from all the rural and other areas we have visited (and written about) in recent years:

• our Forgotten Highway visits to Sutherland, Fraserburg and Matjiesfontein;
• our home base of Umsobomvu local municipality  — Colesberg, Noupoort and Norvalspont;
• Western Cape towns such as Somerset West, Cape Town, Stellenbosch, Milnerton, Gordon’s Bay, Napier, Bredasdorp, Kleinmond, Hermanus, Kleinmond, Elgin, Grabouw, Swellendam, Albertinia, George, Sedgefield, Prince Albert and Leeu Gamka;
• Eastern Cape towns such as Willowmore, Uniondale, Graaff Reinet, Middelburg, Quberha, Sea View, and others;
• Free state towns such as Norvalspont, Bethulie, Springfield, Trompsburg, Bloemfontein and others; and
• towns along the N1, the N2, the N9, the R44, and other national arteries, plus  harbours, airfields and railways.

Variations on a theme

Bodorpe and onderdorpe are old, entrenched terms in South African popular discourse, which are really euphemisms for the privileged / middle-class, previously ‘white’, parts of town, and the working class, previously ‘coloured’ or ‘black’, parts of town, on the ‘other side of the railway line’.

Bodorpe often have different names, such as ‘Noord-Dorp’, and usually enjoy better services including water, refuse removal, sewerage, electricity, roads, health, education, recreation and security.

This is the reason why local government – and local politics – are so important. Indeed, local government is meant to be the most important level or ‘sphere’ of government, precisely because this is the arm of government at the ‘sharp end’ of service delivery – the arm of government most closely and directly responsible for delivering public goods and services.

Yet many people still regard local government as incidental, or less important than national or provincial government. With local government elections looming at the end of next year, and many local governments not performing, or mired in corruption, this is a skewed perspective that needs to be urgently corrected. There is much at stake.

Snakes and ladders

One need not look far for accounts of continued inequalities which need to be addressed. A valuable source of information is a recent research report titled ‘Snakes and ladders and loaded dice: Poverty dynamics and inequality in South Africa between 2008-2017, by Rocco Zizzamia, Sikmone Schotte and Murrary Leibbrandt.

Rocco Zizzamia is a researcher at the Southern Africa Labour and Development Research Unit (SALDRU) at the University of Cape Town; Simone Schotte is a doctoral student and research fellow at the German Institute of Global and Area Studies and the Georg-August-University Göttingen; and Murray Leibbrandt is a Professor in the School of Economics at the University of Cape Town, the director of SALDRU, holds the NRF National Research Chair of Poverty and Inequality Research, and is a Principal Investigator for the National Income Dynamics Study (NIDS).

They report on the results of the National Income Dynamics Study (NIDS), which collects data about a representative sample of South Africans in consecutive years, thereby enabling a ‘rare analysis of socioeconomic class, poverty dynamics, and economic mobility’. The findings – starkly outlining the challenges face by local government – include:

• Being African, female, a single parent, and/or rural is strongly associated with the risk of poverty in South Africa.
• Eight out of 10 South Africans experienced poverty between 2008 and 2017. It is very common for South Africans to move in and out of poverty.
• Over the entire period under study, only 14.7% of households remained above the poverty line and 36.1% remained below the poverty line.
• Nearly half of South Africans (48.8%) were chronically poor during this period, and 12% could be classified as the transient poor.
• An additional 15% of South Africans represent a vulnerable middle class.
• Being African, female, a single parent, and/or rural is strongly associated with the risk of poverty in South Africa.

Poverty and class

The research report states: ‘Most measures of relative wellbeing are derived from snapshots of the economic positions of individuals at a given point in time. While these snapshots can tell us a lot about class and poverty in one moment, they are likely to ignore the more complex dynamics of socioeconomic class in ways that overlook or underestimate the economic vulnerability of people’s lived experience.

‘For example, 55.5% of South African citizens (or five out of 10 people) were living in poverty in 2017. However, according to NIDS data, about 80% (or eight out of 10 South Africans) experienced poverty at least once between 2008–17’.

‘This means that three of every five South Africans who were not poor in 2017 experienced poverty in a different year. These South Africans could remain mostly poor over their lifetime, or it could be that they live mostly middle-class lives and experience poverty only temporarily.’

It concludes that an ‘unacceptably high number of South African households’ live in chronic poverty, and are vulnerable to poverty.

Remedial action

As regards remedial action, the study says that poverty exits can be promoted, and poverty entries prevented, by means of policies that promote labour market entry, increase earned income, and alleviate the burden of household dependents.

Local government and local voters

Local governments cannot address these challenges on their own – a concerted effort by government and other role players is required, in collaboration with the private sector and other role players. However, as the ‘delivery arm’ of state services, local governments could and should play a major role in improving the lives of residents and reducing inequality at a local level.

If they don’t, which is often the case, they vastly reduce the chances of local residents to raise themselves out of poverty, and build better lives. In other words, to prevent them from being trapped in onderdorpe forever.

Ultimately, the only way to improve their performance is for citizens to demand better and more accountable government, primarily through the ballot box. In other words, they need to take local government and local government elections more seriously, and should not regard local government failures as inevitable, or something they cannot change.

This will be a major theme for Toverview going forward, working up to those vital local government elections coming up next year.