{"id":273821,"date":"2018-09-27T07:47:05","date_gmt":"2018-09-27T05:47:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/?p=273821"},"modified":"2018-09-27T07:47:30","modified_gmt":"2018-09-27T05:47:30","slug":"south-africans-can-now-contact-politicians-via-whatsapp-for-better-service-delivery","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/mobile\/273821\/south-africans-can-now-contact-politicians-via-whatsapp-for-better-service-delivery\/","title":{"rendered":"South Africans can now contact politicians via WhatsApp for better service delivery"},"content":{"rendered":"

South Africa has launched the world\u2019s first citizen engagement platform that makes use of popular messenger WhatsApp.<\/p>\n

Speaking at the launch of the GovChat Community Engagement Platform in Cape Town on Tuesday, Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs (Cogta) Deputy Minister Andries Nel explained that the platform is the world’s first citizen engagement platform with inbuilt communication tools on WhatsApp.<\/p>\n

Nel said for the first time in the country\u2019s history, citizens will be able to access over 10,000 public representatives supporting over 30,000 public facilities and services in communities nationwide.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe collaborative effort makes the South African government the first in the world to create a digital communication tool where government becomes instantly accessible to over 16 million people,\u201d Nel said.<\/p>\n

Nel said in rural communities where connection may be slower, GovChat will be available through the Unstructured Supplementary Service Data (USSD) channel.<\/p>\n

To find out more, visit https:\/\/www.govchat.org.za\/en\/<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is very important because our Constitution provides in section 152 that the first objective of local government is to provide democratic and accountable government for local communities.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt is also important because September marks Public Service Month in South Africa,\u201d Nel said.<\/p>\n

The Local Government Structures Act requires, amongst others, that municipalities develop mechanisms to consult communities and community organisations in performing their functions and exercising their powers. In a local government context, these structures are known as ward committees.<\/p>\n

\u201cWard committees have been positioned as a critical structure through which public participation in local government is to be achieved and most importantly, form a link between ward councillors, the community and the municipality.<\/p>\n

\u201cIncreasing protests have, however, shown that government still has to invest more towards promoting participatory governance,\u201d Nel said.<\/p>\n

Nel said poverty, high unemployment and socio-economic exclusion, as well as relative deprivation and inequality in informal urban areas; unhappiness about the provision of services such as electricity, water, sanitation, refuse removal, roads and housing, have all been identified as strong contributing factors to protests.<\/p>\n

\u201cOther causes identified include complaints about political corruption, mismanagement, lack of prompt response by municipalities to citizens\u2019 concerns, dysfunctional administration, lack of meaningful public participation in government processes and service delivery planning,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Nel said it is important to allow citizens to create their own terms of engagement so long as these are harmonious and allow citizens\u2019 voices to be heard.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis calls for government to move away from a prescriptive stance when it comes to facilitating citizen participation, to a position of openness and willingness to learn from citizens and to allow citizens to create their own forums as they see fit,\u201d Nel said.<\/p>\n

\n

Read: New WhatsApp backup could put business chat groups at risk of data breach<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

South Africa has launched the world\u2019s first citizen engagement platform that makes use of popular messenger WhatsApp. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":33,"featured_media":245533,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[34],"tags":[26,2118],"class_list":["post-273821","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-mobile","tag-headline","tag-whatsapp"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/273821","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/33"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=273821"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/273821\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":273829,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/273821\/revisions\/273829"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/245533"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=273821"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=273821"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=273821"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}