Gauteng in ‘polycrisis’ state: 81% dissatisfied with government and 50% with subsidies

Government leadership and academia paint Gauteng as a province with complex problems.

Compiled by the Gauteng City and Region Observatory (GCRO), provincial officials released the results of the 2023/24 Quality of Life (QoL) survey on Tuesday.

This is the seventh such survey that is conducted every two to three years to assess residents’ perception of their lives and their environment.

Datasets from the Quality of Life Survey

The last survey was conducted at the end of 2023 and asked 200 questions to 13,795 respondents from 529 neighborhoods in the province.

Each room had at least 20 participants, with only one person per household randomly selected to complete the questionnaire.

ALSO READ: Nciza: No blame game: ANC must unite for next local government elections

The questions focused on economic and social views, which allowed the GCRO to calculate the QoL index.

This index is based on seven factors: service, socioeconomic status, government satisfaction, health, safety, life satisfaction and participation.

Domestic situations

The survey found that 32% of households surveyed had at least one member receiving the R350 Social Relief Distress grant, up 9% from 2021.

In addition, 50% of households receive some form of social assistance, with 37% of households on the municipal register of the indigent.

The number of children dependent on government feeding schemes represented 48% of households.

20% of households had a child who missed a meal because there was not enough money for food, with 26% of adults in the same position.

Services and perception of government

In terms of municipal services, 92% of respondents had access to piped water, but 60% said it was clean and a further 75% were satisfied with their level of access.

In specific matters, 27% are satisfied with their municipal billing, 37% are satisfied with their roads and 29% are satisfied with the public spaces in their areas.

Overall, 38% were satisfied with access to basic services, and 81% said they were dissatisfied or very dissatisfied with their government.

ALSO READ: ‘Many households food insecure’: survey reveals ‘grim picture’ for poor, ordinary South Africans

In terms of officials, 76% believed that government officials did not put people first, and 75% said they believed the country was headed in the wrong direction.

At least 48% of respondents believed that crime had worsened and even worse, 57% believed that South Africa was a failed state.

The happiness of Gauteng residents

Assessing how residents interacted with others, 69% of respondents participated in social activities, while 57% participated in political activities.

In terms of immediate social support, 7% were dissatisfied with their marriage and 9% were dissatisfied with their interactions with friends.

GCRO’s final analysis determined that people in Gauteng were slightly unhappier than in 2022.

The overall GCRO index score of 59.5 out of 100 was down from 61.4 in 2020/21, now the lowest since 2014.

As a result, respondents are 25% more likely to suffer from depression than in 2017/18.

“Broken social contract”

Professor Edgar Pieterse said it was worrying that the datasets showed a decline, saying society-building was an intergenerational project.

“More fundamentally, what this points to is that our social fabric is being torn apart and the social contract is coming apart,” he said.

“What polycrisis does as a concept is that it really helps us understand the multidimensional nature of people’s everyday lives, but also the larger multidimensional systems in which these experiences are embedded,” Professor Pieterse explained.

“Adaptive Consent”

Gauteng Premier Panyaza Lesufi gave his assessment and described the figures as revealing.

Lesufi said crime affected all facets of the government’s attempts to develop, adding that stabilizing local government was key to making improvements.

ALSO READ: ‘I refuse to wear the lenses of racism’: Tshwane’s new deputy mayor makes big promises

The premier said funding was a challenge, claiming the province “took a bullet” for residents to pay e-toll debts.

To overcome funding challenges, Lesufi promoted the concept of “adaptive consent,” explaining that residents’ consumer choices should be usurped by an obligation to the state.

“Our citizens prefer to pay for other services besides basic services,” he said.

For example, for the SABC to be strong it is not the right consent of our citizens that before you sign up for Netflix, it should be mandatory to pay for a TV license for the SABC,” the Prime Minister said.

The prime minister and his executive will consider the results of the quality of life survey in their next engagements.