POLITICS DELAYING EBONY CLINIC OPENING

Politics are seemingly delaying the opening of the Ebony Park-Kaalfontein Clinic. The R45 million clinic situated at the corner of Mudhopper Street and Archerfish Drive remains closed to the public.

The clinic has been completed more than 6 months ago and has been ready to serve the community of Kaalfontein, Allandale and Ebony Park (KAE).

However, Politics are getting in the way of it being open. The issue is misalignment between the local and provincial spheres of government.

The City of Johannesburg (CoJ) and Gauteng Province are governed by different political parties. The African National Congress (ANC) governs the Gauteng Province whilst since the Local Government Elections In 2016 the City is governed by a coalition government led by the Democratic Alliance (DA).

The clinic is a CoJ property and municipalities are constitutionally bound to offer primary health care services. On the other hand, the province is constitutionally bound and has the capacity to offer 24 hour services such as Emergency, Accident and Maternity services.

KAE News requested an intervention from the Gauteng Department of Health MEC, Dr Bandile Masuku, for the long overdue opening of the clinic. The MEC said that “we had planned to jointly operate the clinic with the City offering primary health care services from 7am to 4pm and the Province operate 24 hours. The understanding broke down on the eve of the opening”. The opening was scheduled to be at the start of October.

“Province has already bought in equipment and hired staff for the purpose. Only to be told by CoJ politicians that there’s no plan in place to run the clinic jointly and there’s no Certificate of Occupation” Masuku said.

He added that “we are ready but I guess we should review the whole platform of healthcare delivery in the Province to close gaps and weaknesses. We are working with COGTA (Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs) and the Premier (David Makhura).”

Dr. Masuku told KAE News that a public meeting will be held soon. KAE News will advise the community accordingly.

The CoJ Health Department was not available for comment at the time of publishing.

In other unrelated news, the ANC Zone 15 will have a conversation with ANC Gauteng Provincial Executive Member, Dr Bandile Masuku on the National Health Insurance (NHI). Meeting is scheduled for Saturday, 26th of October 2019 2pm at Lord Khanyile Community Hall.