FORMER Mayor Zandile Gumede’s continued absence from council meetings was raised at the final meeting of council for the year.
Gumede, who now serves as an ordinary PR councillor after being replaced by Mxolisi Kaunda in September, has not attended a single meeting of council since arriving late at the council meeting at which her successor was inducted.
Councillor Thabani Mthethwa, eEThekwini Democratic Alliance (DA) Chief Whip, who raised Gumede’s absence, said the former mayor was not a member of any Council committee, and as such is did not attend any committee meetings.
“She continues to earn a salary from the municipal coffers despite not doing any work as a councillor and facing serious criminal charges,” he said.
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Mthethwa said two of the four ANC Councillors arrested on 11 December by the Hawks investigative unit for the alleged role they placed in the R208-m DSW tender fraud had also submitted leave under the guise of ‘personal commitments,’ while the other two did not submit any leave applications.
He said all four were out on bail for fraud, allegedly related to the same DSW tender fraud that Gumede and other officials and contractors were also allegedly involved in.
At the meeting on 12 December, the DA forced Council Speaker Weziwe Thusi to call a vote on granting leave in terms of the Rules of Order, and subsequently voted against the matter.
“The DA will continue the fight to ensure that the 62 councillors mentioned as having worked with Gumede, Gumede herself and her co-accused, face the might of the law. The eThekwini Council and Speaker must act against these councillors and haul them before the Ethics Committee. It cannot be business as usual when councillors accused of serious corruption can continue to earn municipal money but do no work. The corrupt 62 must be named, charged and fired,” he said.
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