WATCH: Mayor vows to use second chance to turn things around

The reinstated mayor of Ekurhuleni DA’s Tania Campbell vowed that she and her mayoral team are going to keep their shoulders to the wheel, and to help turn things around in the failing city’s waste and energy departments.

Campbell said, except for political grandstanding criticisms, where there are legitimate issues that require a complete rethink her administration is ready to go back to the drawing board and look at these concerns.

Campbell, who has been a mayor of the city for almost a year before she was voted out last month in a motion of no confidence tabled by the ANC, was voted back into office during a special council sitting convened to elect a new mayor on November 8.
She received 124 votes beating out her political opponent the ANC’s Jongizizwe Dlabathi, who received 99 votes after the ANC failed to reach an agreement with the EFF, which would have seen it garner enough votes to win the position and co-govern the metro.

Initially, the EFF put forward its candidate Nkululeko Dunga to contest the position of mayor, but withdrew its candidate after the ANC nominated its deputy regional chairperson Jongizizwe Dlabathi for the mayor candidacy.
The EFF subsequently helped the DA to reinstate Campbell.

Back in power
The DA-led multi-party coalition government promised to make vigorous efforts to salvage the city’s collapsed departments, the waste and energy departments in particular.
According to the mayor spokesperson, Warren Gwilt, the multi-party coalition government will also be initiating an investigation into reports of sabotage believed to have also contributed to the department’s failures.

“When it comes to waste collection in our city we are aware that there were deliberate efforts made to set back the good work done by the administration. We were about to initiate an investigation, but we got removed from office.
“As we come back into office now, waste and energy are high on the list of priorities to sort out and initiating the investigation into the sabotage remains our commitment too,” explained Gwilt.

Proliferation of potholes

With the rainy season, which usually sees the proliferation of potholes across the city’s road network, the Boksburg Advertiser asked the mayoral office if there are measures put in place to tackle the problem before it gets worse.
Gwilt said the city is aware of the possible surge in potholes during the period and as part of the government’s back-to-basics programme, plans will be made to intensify pothole repair work.

“You can recall that last term when we were here we initiated a pothole programme to fix potholes and I think now that we are back, the programme, which is an initiative of the executive but the function of the city, will carry on. The key thing now is to intensify that programme.
“We also need to ensure that the people who are doing the jobs are fit for the purpose so that the potholes do not come back in only a few weeks and three times bigger than it was.”

Action plan
Campbell said the coalition will be hitting the ground running to serve the residents who have been left in limbo during this period.
“We take service delivery seriously and council is not a place where you play games.
“We always say we are willing to take the opposition benches as long as there is stability within our city and services to our residents.
“We have a very hard task and we are all up for that very hard task. We will have the officials back on board, and soon you will be seeing a turnaround strategy from us as well.”

Lessons learned
When asked if she has learned anything from the whole process that led to her being ousted, such as the accusation that she was focusing more on affluent areas and neglecting the townships, Campbell responded: “It would be ignorant of me not to do some introspection and see where we went wrong. I always say that I have got an open door policy with all the parties that want to discuss any matters with me as the mayor.

“I’m also prepared to set up a roundtable with political parties and see what the problems are that they feel are not attended to properly.
“We have instituted the back-to-basics programme, which allows us to visit communities every single Friday so that I can see on the ground what is happening and not just rely on a report. So yes, we are going to look at that and make corrective measures and see where we can improve.
“The notion that I’m not in a township is a notion. I spend 80% of my time in townships. As a mayor, I look at Ekurhuleni as a collective. We have to concentrate on the poor of the poor and we have to make sure that we make our budget available for the poor of the poor.”

Lack of funds
The city is reportedly facing a financial crisis, which is manifested by its failure to timeously pay money due to suppliers who provided services and is most likely to impact even staff salaries in the next few months.
The mayor admitted that there is a stretch on finances, blaming the problem on the costs of load-shedding to the city.

“If you have a look at the first load-shedding then the city lost R2b. For the second stage six load-shedding, I have not received the report as yet, but I do have a forecast that it would not be a favourable one.
“We are in the process of bringing in the adjustment budget processes into the council. We will look at the departments that are not performing, and what is not essential, and redirect money where it is crucially needed. One of the areas where money will be redirected is the collapsed solid waste department.”

Collapsed
Former Ekurhuleni mayor ANC’s Mzwandile Masina also called a press briefing after the elections where he hit out against the DA-led coalition government but pointed out that they are happy with the outcome and accept the new mayor.

“We will work with the mayor and will also continue to expose all the wrong things that she is unable to do as you saw the riots in Thembisa and elsewhere.
“Things have collapsed, services are no longer being rendered, with waste not being collected for weeks.
“We have submitted the motion of no confidence on mayor Tania Campbell based on the government’s inability to deliver services, especially in the townships.
“As we speak to you now, the city has collapsed. It’s difficult.
“Things are going to be worse in January. They are not going to be able to pay workers’ salaries. They will have to rob Peter to pay Paul.

“We successfully negotiated with seven smaller parties, but could not reach an agreement with other parties we would have thought they would assist us to take over, and that’s it.
“What we saw in the negotiations was an extreme level of arrogance that we have had to salvage the dignity of our organisation.
“We can’t do deals as the ANC, we can only do principled agreement and if we can’t reach an agreement that’s about it. We are not bitter.”

ANC mayoral candidate Jongizizwe Dlabathi said: “We are quite happy that we were able to mount a motion which had substantial reasons that qualified the removal of the mayor. It’s rather shocking that those who enabled the process of restoring the mayor also agreed with us that under her watch the city has collapsed.”

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