Community Participation in Mahikeng Local Municipality: Power Relations Perspective

2019 ◽  
Vol 55 (3) ◽  
pp. 446-456
Author(s):  
Mandla Mfundo Masuku ◽  
Mokgadi Patience Molope
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
Public Participation ◽  
Community Participation ◽  
Power Relations ◽  
Local Governance ◽  
North West ◽  
The North ◽  
Local Municipality ◽  
Constitutional Right ◽  
The Impact

In South Africa, community members have the constitutional right to partake in local governance and the local municipal council has the constitutional mandate to facilitate community participation. Qualitative research was used to assess the impact of power relations on community participation in the Mahikeng Local Municipality. The study findings indicate that power differentials contributed to the abandonment of the legislative provisions in the Mahikeng Local Municipality in the North-West Province of South Africa. Among other things, this paper recommends finalisation of the draft public participation framework. The framework should clearly identify and define the roles of the community, elected councillors and traditional authorities. The paper recommends the development of a strategy that includes clear and comprehensive public participation guidelines, protocols and processes to facilitate implementation of the framework. In consultation with the community, a detailed community participation schedule must be developed, implemented and continuously monitored and evaluated.

scholarly journals Recurrent drought in the Dr Ruth Segomotsi Mompati District Municipality of the North West Province in South Africa: An environmental justice perspective

2012 ◽  
Vol 4 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Gideon Van Riet
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
Environmental Justice ◽  
Secondary Data ◽  
Initial Study ◽  
North West ◽  
Individual Interviews ◽  
The North ◽  
North West Province ◽  
Group Interviews ◽  
The Impact

This article adopts an environmental justice approach to recurrent drought in the North-West Province of South Africa. It is based on a secondary data analysis of a study – of which the author was a research team member – conducted in the Dr Ruth Segomotsi Mompati District Municipality in February 2007, which assessed the impact of drought on older people. The methodology used during the initial study included observation, individual interviews, focus group interviews and participatory research. The author of the present article suggests, however, that discourses of Disaster Risk Management (DRM) and ’legislative compliance’, as in many other South African contexts, have not yet been a particularly useful framing for issues of disaster and drought. The author suggests that environmental justice discourses might offer a more useful framing or conceptualisation for those concerned with the issue of recurrent drought in the study area or similar contexts.

scholarly journals The impact of using smartphones on the academic performance of undergraduate students

2018 ◽  
pp. 290-308
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
Academic Performance ◽  
Undergraduate Students ◽  
Quantitative Research ◽  
Research Approach ◽  
North West ◽  
The North ◽  
The Impact

This study investigated the impact of using smartphones on the academic performance of undergraduate students at the North-West University, South Africa. To determine the impact, this study deployed the quantitative research approach to collect data from 375 undergraduate students using questionnaires. It was found that most undergraduate students are using their smartphones to engage with fellow students and lecturers. It was also found that using smartphones distracts students from their studies in certain aspects. The results also showed the impact of using smartphones on students’ academic capabilities and progression.

scholarly journals Accelerated nutrition transition in the North West Province of South Africa: results from the Prospective Urban and Rural Epidemiology (PURE-NWP-SA) cohort study, 2005 to 2010

2018 ◽  
Vol 21 (14) ◽  
pp. 2630-2641 ◽  
Author(s):  
Edelweiss Wentzel-Viljoen ◽  
Sarie Lee ◽  
Ria Laubscher ◽  
Hester H Vorster
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
Energy Intake ◽  
Rural Areas ◽  
Nutrition Transition ◽  
Nutrient Intakes ◽  
North West ◽  
The North ◽  
North West Province ◽  
The Impact ◽  
Over Time

AbstractObjectiveSouth Africa (SA) is in the midst of a health transition characterized by a quadruple burden of diseases and a nutrition transition. The existing nutrition transition in SA, accompanied by the coexistence of under- and overnutrition in the population, motivated the present study. Its objectives were to measure and report the changes in nutrient intakes of rural and urban black Africans over time to assess the impact of urbanization and modernization of lifestyles on dietary intakes and non-communicable disease (NCD) risk.DesignThe PURE-NWP-SA study recruited 2000 black South African volunteers aged 35–70 years in 2005, of which detailed nutrient intakes from 1858 participants were available. In 2010 nutrient intakes of a cohort of 1154 participants were measured.ResultsMedian energy intake increased over time. In 2010, rural participants consumed the amount of energy (men 9·7 MJ/d; women 9·1 MJ/d) that urban participants consumed in 2005 (men 9·9 MJ/d; women 9·0 MJ/d). The nutrition transition was characterized by increases in the percentage of energy from animal protein, total fat (rural men and women), saturated (not urban women) and monounsaturated fat, as well as added sugar. Despite the higher energy intake, not all the participants met total micronutrient needs in 2010.ConclusionsThe PURE nutrient intake data confirmed that the nutrition transition in the North West Province of SA is extremely rapid in rural areas. The shift towards higher energy intakes, an animal food-based diet, higher intakes of fat and lower intake of fibre, at the cost of lower plant protein and starchy food intakes, could increase the risk of NCD.

scholarly journals Foreword

2017 ◽  
Vol 14 (3) ◽  
pp. 1
Author(s):  
Werner Böhler
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
Sustainable Development ◽  
Land Tenure ◽  
Southern Africa ◽  
Good Governance ◽  
Joint Project ◽  
North West ◽  
The North ◽  
The Impact

The seminar hosted Potchefstroom in April 2010, entitled 'Good Governance in Land Tenure', followed in the tradition of cooperation between the Faculty of Law of the North West University and Konrad Adenauer Stiftung in South Africa. We started our cooperation fourteen years ago with a joint series of seminars under the title 'Constitution and Law'. In 2008 we started our joint project on good governance in Southern Africa with the focus on the impact of globalisation on good governance in Southern Africa, and in 2009 we discussed the topic 'good governance as a mechanism to promote sustainable development in Southern Africa'.

An analysis of interlibrary loan services: a case study of a university in South Africa

2018 ◽  
Vol 46 (1) ◽  
pp. 26-37 ◽  
Author(s):  
Siviwe Bangani ◽  
Sabelo Chizwina ◽  
Mathew Moyo
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
Information Seeking ◽  
Global Financial Crisis ◽  
Information Resources ◽  
Interlibrary Loan ◽  
Content Type ◽  
North West ◽  
The North ◽  
Library Users ◽  
The Impact

Purpose The landscape of teaching, learning and research has changed requiring the need for diverse information resources. Given the current budgetary constraints and financial conditions prevailing in many universities, sharing of information resources has become a necessity. The Interlibrary Loan (ILL) services have thus become an important service to meet the immediate needs of library users. The aim of this paper is to analyse the ILL services of the North-West University in South Africa from 2006 to 2016. Using statistical data, the paper shows the emerging pattern in borrowing and lending between institutions as well as determines the existence of correlations between borrowing and lending libraries. The results of this study show that ILL amongst libraries has decreased in the past 11 years. A need exists for increased awareness of ILL and there is need for technological innovations that will ensure that library users are able to request for information resources seamlessly. Design/methodology/approach This is a quantitative study that uses ILL data from the North-West University. Data were downloaded from the SABINET ILL system using the three NWU JC codes. They were then collated and uploaded on excel spreadsheets. In the main, the excel spreadsheets were used to interpret the data. Further, the Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) software, in particular Spearman’s Correlation Analysis, was used to test correlations between data from libraries that requested information resources from NWU and data from libraries that supplied information resources to NWU during this period using Rumsey’s guidelines to interpret the correlations. Findings The findings of the study reveal that ILL among libraries in South Africa had generally declined owing mostly to the proliferation of online resources resulting to changes in user information-seeking behaviour. The decline is despite the challenges of low budgets received by most libraries for the acquisition of information resources. It can also be concluded that public university libraries still value ILL as demonstrated by the high number of items requested from other libraries. The findings also reveal that most ILL activities were conducted by public universities. Research limitations/implications It was not possible to obtain the list of titles that have been requested and also to obtain the user’s details. This would have enabled the authors to determine the type of titles that are being requested, and the users that request them. Practical implications ILL should continue to be enhanced in view of the challenge of dwindling library budgets against the escalating prices of information resources. There is also a need for user education so that they become aware of the ILL service. From experience, library users normally give up once they realize that what they wanted is not available through the local catalogue and this calls for librarians to create an awareness to users that ILL could help solve their frustrations. Social implications These results show that ILL can play a significant role to level the playing field between the well-resourced libraries in urbanized regions or provinces and the poorly resourced ones in rural regions or provinces. This social justice aspect of ILL is probably the reason why better resourced libraries in South Africa have decided to remain in the scheme unlike other countries where better resourced libraries opted out of reciprocal arrangements with small and medium-sized institutions. Originality/value The study adds to a very limited number of studies emanating from Africa. A study of this nature has never been conducted in Africa, as previous studies were nationwide studies. As far as the authors know, this is the first study that uses ILL data to research the impact of the global financial crisis on libraries in Africa.

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