ANC and DA lock horns over council debate on De Lille

The news that the DA Cape Town caucus has passed a motion of no confidence with overwhelming majority against mayor Patricia de Lille has left the ANC Dullar Omar region leaders seething and bracing for a council fight.

This is because ANC caucus in the City of Cape Town has already submitted a motion of no confidence against de Lille which is scheduled to be debated next week Thursday. The party is anticipating the DA will want its own motion tabled and debated before theirs to circumvent an embarrassing situation where de Lille is removed on a motion sponsored by the official opposition in the council chambers.

84 DA councillors voted in favour of the motion last night, with 59 caucus members opposing the motion. One member cast a spoilt vote, according to information provided by provincial DA leader Bonginkosi Madikizela.

“We are informed that they agreed to pass a motion of no confidence in a divided caucus. We already submitted a motion last year in November, the DA speaker has been playing games. We were told our motion will be tabled in the council on the 31st of January.

“You need 10 days in which to submit the motion. They agreed to table the motion which will be in less than ten days. They must still submit their own motion to the Speaker of Council [Dirk Smit].  Ours is a motion of no confidence in the mayor of the city, we assume their motion is all about their factions in the DA,” said Vuyiso Tshalisisu, Dullar Omar secretary.

READ MORE: Motion of no confidence passed against De Lille

Tshalisisu characterised DA’s behaviour as nothing short of a cover-up and an attempt to assuage the state of corruption within the DA in the city.

“When our councillors that sat in the transport committee, they uncovered irregularities and that the mayor was covering for officials. It was not long before we uncovered that there are certain things that were not done right, including [the matter involving [Brett Herron, MMC], Melissa Whitehead [suspended city transport commissioner] and the [resigned] city manager Achmat Ebrahim].

“This is when they wanted to chase out two councillors out of the chamber for raising this motion. Our councillors raised these things sharply. This is when we submitted our motion . Our pre-occupation as the opposition is to expose maladministration and remove the DA from power,” Tshalisisu explained.

He said as far the ANC in Cape Town is concerened, “De Lille represents a corrupt party. The deputy mayor also received a forensic report in 2016 which implicated other officials. If they submit the motion we will not be surprised, they are the majority that’s always breaking rules of council.”

He mentioned the recent amendment of the delegation of authority for the deputy mayor to be in charge of the water crisis a key indicator that the DA is good with speaking against corruption but fails to act against. He said the ANC will have a meeting next week Monday to look at their options should the DA use its majority to table their own motion outside of the 10 days period required by council rules.

In a short text message a shortwhile ago, De Lille wrote the following to The Citizen: “I [De Lille] respect the processes of the party and I will await the decision of the federal executive.” Spokeperson Xolani Koyana added that the mayor will not be making any further comments on the matter.