By 
The current leadership of Mangaung Metropolitan Municipality (MMM) have managed to stabilise the ship and reposition it into an investment destination of choice. Stability in any economy is vital as it inspires investment and development.
The Metro between 2022 and 2023 was rocked by instability in its leadership which affected its effectiveness in delivering services to its people. It was motion of no confidence after motion of no confidence; coupled with acting persons in senior positions of the City.
As a result, the City experienced a lot of service delivery protests, shutdowns and being unable to pay salaries. Mangaung Metro was also downgraded by rating agency Moody’s twice and later placed under administration, both on provincial and national.
At this point, the Murphy’s Law seemed to apply to the metro; everything that could go wrong went wrong. Collecting revenue seemed also to be one of the biggest challenges for Mangaung with residents not paying for services, even government departments owing the municipality large amounts for services.
The current leadership in Mangaung Metro led by the Executive Mayor Cllr Gregory Nthatisi has managed to stabilise the City, working from within, appointing qualified persons to the vacant senior positions, stabilising the council and providing regular services to communities, though this still has a long way to go, but there are signs of improvement, especially in waste collection.
Protests in the metro have noticeably decreased, regular economic activity has been stabilise and the leadership is currently pushing to turn the metro around and turn it into a construction site instead of a sore sight of sewerage flowing down the streets and in the yards of citizens.
Mangaung Metro held two indabas leading up to the main event, the two days Investment Summit. It hosted a property and infrastructure indaba respectively, where expects in the respective areas where invited to advise the City on how to improve and attract investors in those sectors.
During the investment Summit, it was inspiring to here and see continuity, some of the plans that were presented during the former Executive Mayor’s tenure Cllr Thabo Manyoni were reintroduced. These were plans that were cast aside as the metro changed hands, from one factional leader to another, and the state of metro deteriorated.
Amongst the plans presented by the City Manager Sello More, was the N8 corridor development, which will attract a number of investors and will create numerous jobs, furthermore, the building of bridges, the airport node and the Kwaggafontein Zoo were reintroduced. The Zoo will see animals roaming freely while people visiting the Zoo will be in cages.
Mangaung Metro is the largest contributor towards the Free State Province’s GDP and it is the only metro in the province, the City presents a number of lucrative investment opportunities that makes very attractive. It is kudos to the leadership for managing to stabilise the City, they still have to deal with a lot of issues, especially the aging infrastructure that is over a 100 years, but there is light at the end of the tunnel, there is hope for the people of Mangaung Metro and its economy.
The City is now stable and bankable; it inspires investor confidence, both domestic and foreign.
