Dissatisfied minority parties in the City of Ekurhuleni (CoE) launched a motion of no confidence against the Executive Mayor Doctor Xhakaza, accusing him of failure to steer the city in the right direction.
However, the mayor has in response claimed corrupt senior municipal officials orchestrated this motion to halt investigations into an R2b scandal, with the bone of contention being a council agenda item that seeks to intensify a probe into the manipulation of electricity accounts.
The Independent Citizen Movement (ICM) filed the motion to remove the mayor. The African Christian Democratic Party (ACDP) seconded the motion.
The party requested the speaker to, upon adoption of the item, convene an extraordinary council meeting within seven days to elect a new mayor.
The motion had not gone through the council’s programming committee by March 11, so it is unclear if it will be among the items to be tabled in this month’s council meeting on March 27.
Poor leadership
In a document seen by the Boksburg Advertiser, ICM councillor Dr Joe Mojapelo, the city’s former COO fired after irregularities in a municipal project were uncovered, stated the mayor has failed to fulfil his statutory obligations and leadership responsibilities.
He stated that these include, but are not limited to, financial mismanagement, leadership failures and neglecting recommendations from the extraordinary council meetings recently convened to address the city’s financial woes.
No-confidence motion won’t stop us – mayor
Responding to the planned motion against him during a service delivery outreach programme in Benoni, Xhakaza described the motion as a frivolous matter by some councillors who are in the pockets of corrupt senior officials of the city.
The mayor said as part of their effort to rid the city of corruption and hold senior management accountable for their actions, an investigation led by Finance MMC Jongizizwe Dlabathi uncovered wrongdoing to an estimated R2b shortfall in revenue.
He said the vast revenue loss stems from manipulation of about 1 600 electricity accounts, where, for example, one night a municipal customer’s accounts would reflect the customer owes the city about R20 000, and in the morning that money is no longer there.
They, on February 27, brought the report before the council to deliberate on how best the city can handle the matter, take further investigation to find those responsible and implement corrective measures to prevent further revenue loss in that fashion.
The mayor pointed out they called on the Auditor-General to do an independent investigation into the R2b shortfall, which largely contributed to revenue loss in the city.
“We are on course to sort out the rot, and frivolous motions of political parties in the hands of the people who are committing this rot will not deter us. We are going to beat the bushes until the tigers come out. And when they come out, we will put them in a cage.
“It is time we get administrators to account. They are hell-bent on doing everything possible to ensure the report does not go through council.
“We will act on it and escalate it to the Gauteng Cogta MEC. If possible, we will even go to court to get a declaratory order. We must clean this city of the rot that has contributed so much to the loss of public money, and I am here to do that.
“We have during elections, since 2021 seen changes in political offices, but the officials remain the same. The same officials causing all the rot are mobilising politicians to put frivolous motions, just because we want them to account. We will not change; they must account and until they account, we are not giving up.”
The mayoral motion of no confidence comes hot on the heels of the speaker, Nthabiseng Tshivhenga’s, motion of no confidence by the Inkatha Freedom Party (IFP) being withdrawn.
The IFP tabled the motion in February to have Tshivhenga ousted, accusing her of failing to keep order and the decorum of conduct in the council.
However, the party withdrew the motion just before it could be heard in council on March 27, saying parties that initially agreed to support the motion requested more time for negotiations and consultations.
Also Read: IFP brings no-confidence vote against speaker
