A planner at heart, the portfolio head for development planning and urban management believes the greatest challenge is the inner city and transforming formerly marginalised communities like Orange Farm and Diepsloot into liveable, sustainable places.

Councillor Ruby Mathang

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OBURG is a "fast town, with huge momentum and speed", says Ruby Mathang, the mayoral committee member for development planning and urban management. "There is never a dull moment in Joburg."

Born in the city of gold, Mathang says other cities, like Cape Town, East London and Port Elizabeth, are fine to visit for holidays, but it's always good to come back to his hometown. "Joburg is a melting pot, a place where people want to come."

He lives in Soweto, where he was born in 1959, and has raised his three children in the township. He feels it's important to remain there. "I don't intend leaving Soweto – some of us must be there to change the place. There's a stronger case once you're there to try to find ways of dealing with issues."

Mathang's portfolio requires him to oversee the functioning of the whole City. "This involves the day-to-day challenges faced by cities – a signboard falls down, or a manhole cover goes missing, or a taxi doing something illegal. All those things put together cause urban decay."

The department is placed at the centre of responsibility to make Johannesburg a functional urban landscape. Through its forward spatial planning division, the department gives direction to the public, and investors in particular, as to where and how development should take place.

There is also the administrative arm of the department, dealing with town planning applications and enforcement of by-laws, so ensuring quality for residents.

Urban management
The department's urban management component is new, established in March 2006 when the newly elected mayoral committee came into office. "We have a clear definition of what urban management entails," Mathang says. "The scope of the work and a business plan have been prepared."

Previously, departments worked in silos, but now there is cohesion and integration through a variety of means, including a capital investment management system. This means, for instance, that applications for infrastructure from developers will only be considered if they comply with the guidelines laid down by the department's development plan.

Mathang is himself a town planner, having completed his town planning degree at the University of the Witwatersrand in 2005; he is working on his master's degree.

In 1994 he became a councillor and chaired the planning portfolio of the Northern Metropolitan Local Council from 1995 to 2000. In 2001 he briefly chaired the Town Planning Tribunal.

YMCA chairmanship
But the chairmanship that means the most to him is that of the Young Men's Christian Association, or YMCA. He joined the YMCA board in 1994, later becoming chairperson, a position he still holds.

In 1997, Mathang was made a national executive committee member of the YMCA sub-region, which includes Botswana, Zambia and Zimbabwe.

"I love the YMCA. It answers the moral decay in society. It is an anchor to many other things that can be changed into a healthy environment."

It runs so many programmes that are based on Christian principles, keeping youngsters active and teaching them life skills. Mathang's father was a devout Christian, and did not allow his children to read certain magazines; he also insisted that they went to church every Sunday.

Mathang has not been that strict on his own children, and has allowed them to choose whether to attend Sunday church services.

"Christianity is a big influence in my life – it has helped to restrain me from what I would otherwise have done growing up." Growing up in Orlando he saw others smoking dagga, breaking into houses and harming others. "[Christianity] has helped me to respect and love others."

Challenges
He sees as his greatest challenge the inner city and the formerly marginalised communities of Orange Farm, Diepsloot and others that need to be transformed into liveable, sustainable communities.

"The challenge is good as there is also an element of hope that keeps us going. We have hope that we will overcome the problems facing these communities and that one day they will be liberated from the confines of apartheid planning."

On a micro level, community participation and buy-in is another challenge. He would like to see a combination of education and feedback from communities. "The communities must tell us how to assist them to make planning entirely successful. It is seen all over the world that planning is only really successful when people own it, as opposed to plans being brought in without community participation."

He cites examples in Yeoville and Hillbrow, where the community has started an improvement initiative, taking positive steps towards urban management and ensuring safety in the neighbourhood. "These are the sorts of initiatives that will unlock the full potential of areas that have been neglected over the decades, of course with the government as the number one partner."

Mathang would like to see a commitment from property owners to clean and paint their buildings. They have been given incentives in the form of urban development zones and concessions.

Since being appointed in March 2006, Mathang has overseen, together with his executive director Phil Harrison, the co-ordination of departments involved in development and urban planning into a "common vision" and "not in little corners doing their own thing".

Always a politician
In a sense Mathang has always been a politician. He was 17 when Soweto exploded in the June 16 riots in 1976. He was a school representative at the time, and his schooling was disrupted. He took his fellow learners from Selelekela Senior Secondary School to join the march on that day.

Being a leader then "set me apart from friends". And although he grew up with friends and neighbours and lived as "one big close-knit family", there are those that "rise up from this".

In 1977 he dropped out of Bantu education and the following year enrolled in Sached, an independent education trust run by NGOs. He matriculated in 1981, while he stayed with Dr Robin Peterson. Today Peterson is the chief executive officer of the Premier Soccer League, but at the time he was an activist and member of the End Conscription Campaign.

He was influenced by a Black Consciousness teacher at his school who "mobilised a lot of students in a huge way".

Mathang started working at Cerachem, a chemical factory, and between 1983 and 1985 was a Chemical Industrial Workers' Union shop steward. Between 1984 and 1986 he was the chairperson of the Molapo branch of the South African Youth Congress. He was also active in the United Democratic Front, and chaired the Molapo branch of the South African Civics Association.

In 2002 he took a break from politics to study. "I always wanted to study but there was no time and money earlier." He comes from a family of 16 children.

And if he weren't a politician, what would he be? "It is rather difficult to imagine living or working in South Africa without political sensitivity. It was also through politics that I became interested in the planning field, because our politics have always been about space and questions as to who belongs in certain spaces. So the answer to that is that I would be a planner, but a very politically inclined one."

When not in planning meetings or consulting with his team, Mathang enjoys playing golf, going sightseeing, taking his family on picnics at Hartebeesfontein Dam and going on holiday to Mozambique.

Just hope those golf courses have had urban planning approval from his department.