Document: Thabazimbi LM: IDP 2012/2013

Development planning in the Local Sphere is conducted through the Integrated Development Planning instrument. Each Municipality in terms of the Municipal Systems Act (2000) is responsible for:

• Formulating
• Adopting and
• Implementing the Integrated Development Plan (IDP).

The Mayor is to drive the IDP process and has to be adopted by the Municipal Council. Community participation and involvement is central to IDPs. Community/Ward based planning can be a useful way for making more structured inputs in the IDP process and for organising community needs into account together with wider strategic issues incorporating Provincial and National priorities and strategies.

The IDP should reflect the best possible development decisions and trade-offs that focus on viability  of Economic, Social, Environmental, Financial and Institutional Sustainability. The Municipal Systems Act, 2000 (Act No. 32 of 2000) prescribes that municipalities should determine a vision for long-term development, development objectives for the elected term of the council and development strategies which are to be aligned with national and provincial sector plans and planning requirements. 

These legal requirements correspond perfectly to the requirements of modern municipal management, i.e. all role-players in a municipality need a joint vision as a common ground which provides guidance to everybody - the municipal governing bodies as well as the residents - and which gives direction beyond the council’s term of office.  

The council’s decisions have to be orientated to clearly defined and agreed objectives, which at the same time give orientation to management, and which form the basis for performance management and the accountability of the municipal government towards the residents. The activities of the executive bodies of the council need to be guided and streamlined by strategies which are the result of a joint decision making process in which the executing agencies and all concerned parties are involved (IDP Guidelines, 2001).