Progress and challenges of service delivery in South Africa since 1994

The new South Africa came into existence in 1994. The incoming government faced a massive task of fiscal, political, social and economic transformation, all of which would require an effective public service capability. Yet the public service itself had been subject during the Apartheid era to the same limitations as other key South African institutions. Due to the lack of know how in 1994, South Africa needed an overwhelming transformation of public service focus, culture and procedures. Yet, 15 years after the democratic dispensation’s arrival, many people still lack access to the most basic of necessities. Woolard (2002) in Burger (2005:483) argues that it is visible that poverty is South Africa’s priority as it is estimated that approximately 37% of South African households , and probably more today, survive on less than R1 000 in a month