Chapter three: Democracy and good political governance Local government and traditional leaders 195. The stakeholder consultations paid a lot of attention to local government, which was regarded by a number of stakeholders as a ‘thorny issue’. Reference was made to the constitution, the Chiefs Act of 1968 and the Local Government Act of 1997. Two main complaints were expressed everywhere. The first was that the national government has not made adequate resources available to local government; hence the comment that the “the purpose was good, practice not”. Although the councils are permitted to generate local revenues from rates and other activities, this is often not viable. Therefore, the councils depend entirely on central government grants. The stakeholders thus stated that local councils cannot function appropriately because they do not have adequate financial resources and lack human capacity. 196. The second complaint referred to the tension between traditional authorities and local government councillors, which tension was attributed to the lack of a clear definition of the duties and responsibilities of local government. Two chiefs, nominated by the other chiefs, are represented on the community and the district councils. However, some chiefs accused the councils of encroaching on the authority and responsibilities of traditional leaders in the allocation of land. Some stakeholders further alleged that certain councillors disrespected the chiefs and Basotho tradition. The other issue was the perceived low capacities of the councillors and suggestions were made that they needed a lot of training. Interestingly, there were also strong sentiments that the chiefs also required capacity development. 197. The CRM observed that there appears to be confusion over the definition and boundaries of the functions, responsibilities and roles of the chiefs and of community and district councils. There is also similar confusion regarding public servants and councillors within the councils. There is indeed tension in some localities between local councils and the chiefs. In the words of one stakeholder, “The councillors appear to be elevated, although the chiefs are the governors.” There is slow implementation of projects where such tensions exist and stakeholders called for solutions to be found as soon as possible. Most of the time, they stated that training of both the councillors and the chiefs could ameliorate such tension, as the two groups would better understand their respective roles and would work together cooperatively. 198. The root of the confusion appears to be the noncongruence of the 1968 Chieftainship Act and the 1997 Local Government Act. The Chieftainship Act gives the power of land allocation to the chiefs, whereas the Local Government Act gives the functions of land and site allocation to the councils. The section dealing with land allocation in the Chieftainship Act was not amended or repealed when the Local Government Act was adopted; hence both the chiefs and the councils have the function of allocating land. However, the CRM was told that the Village Development Order of 1979 had already revoked the power of the chiefs to allocate land and that it was therefore unnecessary for the Local Government Act to repeal the same. Nevertheless, the CRM was unable to verify this, because the order could not be found. 65