Benefits of good corporate governance principles: A study of the city of Tshwane, South Africa

Abstract

Annual reports issued by the City of Tshwane (2015) for the financial years 2010 to 2014 show that the City of Tshwane has received qualified audit reports from the South African Auditor General (2015). The two key causes of underperformance were lack of adherence to norms and standards that are applicable to municipal service delivery and lack of adherence to the fundamental principles of good corporate governance (King, 2009). A study was conducted in the City of Tshwane, South Africa in order to assess and evaluate the degree of adherence to good corporate governance principles stipulated by Mervin King (King, 2009) in the form of the King III report. Data was collected from a stratified random sample of size 1, 012 residents of the City of Tshwane. Stratification was done by geographical zone. Data was collected from respondents by using a structured, pre-tested and validated questionnaire of study consisting of 22 indicators of service quality. The study found that 84.37% of respondents who took part in the study were satisfied with the overall quality of municipal services that were provided to them by the City of Tshwane. Only 15.63% of respondents were not satisfied with the overall quality of services provided to them. The study showed that most of the respondents had a positive perception on the quality of routine municipal services such as water and lights and waste removal by employees of the City of Tshwane. The study showed that the degree of satisfaction of residents, ratepayers and stakeholders with the quality of municipal services that were provided to them was significantly influenced by the degree of motivation of employees of the City of Tshwane at work, the ability of employees of the City of Tshwane to treat all customers with respect, the ability of employees of the City of Tshwane to provide adequate answers promptly to queries raised by customers, and the degree to which employees of the City of Tshwane were skilled on technical issues, in a decreasing order of strength.