North West ANC ‘redeploys’ scores of mayors, chief whips

The North West ANC has fired a large number of mayors and chief whips of municipalities – the largest to be moved in the name of political redeployment.

But many ANC members said the move was politically motivated and had nothing to do with deployment because some of the axed mayors were competent.

The South African Communist Party and the Congress of South African Trade Unions (Cosatu) said they were not consulted and had reservations about some of the redeployments.

ANC North West’s decision follows assessment of performances

The ANC decision follows an assessment of the performances of the redeployed in terms of the Local Government Barometer document.

The ANC provincial executive committee (PEC) has denied targeting certain individuals with their action.

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It told journalists this week that it had conducted a mid-term assessment of the 22 municipalities and councillors in North West as part of its programme of action.

This was designed to stabilise the councils and enable them to deliver basic services.

“The issue of non-performance cannot be tolerated ever again in the ANC,” the party said.

Leadership known as the ‘troika’

At the core of the assessment were the performance of leadership known as the “troika” comprising mayors, speakers and whips of councils.

They were expected to account to the PEC – which was accompanied by regional executive committees – about their leadership performances in the ANC caucuses, implementation of the People First programme, service delivery, good governance, building capable government and local economic development.

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But the SACP and Cosatu said they were not consulted before the ANC’s latest actions.

Some in the ANC said this was a witch-hunt to deal with PEC opponents.

ANC secretary-general Fikile Mbalula had previously expressed concerns about the targeting of councillors, especially mayors, who were seen as opponents of the PEC in North West.

Mayors moved from positions and redeployed

The assessment saw mayors being moved from their positions and redeployed, which meant losing their current jobs to be moved to new tasks or demoted.

Those removed were Kagisano-Molopo local municipality executive mayor Tshireletso Marabutse and Matlosana mayor James Tsolela who was replaced by Fikile Mahlophe recently.

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The axe also fell on Taung local municipality mayor Tumisang Gaoraelwe and Cliffton Groep, mayor of the Naledi local municipality.

The PEC also acted on party caucuses in the municipalities. It redeployed Matlosana local municipality chief whip Khaya Ndincede.

This was followed by a series of his counterparts including Naledi’s Letshwene Ramodibedi, Kgetleng local municipality’s Amogelang Selaledi and Rustenburg’s Louisa Mabe.

How many leaders suddenly incompetent?

This left people questioning how so many senior leaders had suddenly become incompetent at the same time and prompted speculation that this was a witch-hunt by the PEC.

Cosatu North West provincial secretary Kopano Konopi said they were not opposed to the decision but were concerned that they were not consulted on the latest redeployments.

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Konopi said the ANC had consulted them “from the beginning to the end” regarding the redeployment of the Bojanala district and the Matlosana local municipalities’ mayors but had failed to do so regarding all other municipalities.

“We met with the ANC yesterday [Wednesday] and they apologised for this. We don’t say that they must not take these decisions but we want to be consulted, we don’t want to be caught off-guard,” Konopi said.

SACP’s ‘serious reservations’ about actions taken

SACP provincial secretary Madoda Sambatha said they had serious reservations about the actions taken against mayors in Matlosana, Taung and Naledi.

He said in Taung it was not only Gaoraelwe who was at fault but the entire troika.

He said Groep’s redeployment had nothing to do with performance because the municipality had performed well in infrastructure budget expenditure.

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