Picture: Michel Bega
The Sekhukhune region in Limpopo leads the pack with VBS Mutual Bank-tainted former ANC mayors, and the South African Communist Party (SACP) and the Bolsheviks Party want all of them gone as soon as yesterday.
The SACP held its provincial executive committee (PEC) meeting on Tuesday and the dismissal of the mayors topped the agenda, with many accusing the ANC-led government of rewarding its deployees in government with lucrative jobs, despite their questionable involvement in the investment of municipal millions into the now defunct bank.
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The party also wants all tainted MECs who were deployed during premier Stan Mathabatha’s contentious October Cabinet reshuffle and all heads of departments who got jobs in state-owned enterprises to be shown the door.
“Despite having showed our discontentment with the reshuffle in October, the SACP continues to see no application of consequence management on those fingered in the investigative reports of the Special Investigative Unit, the public protector and other crime combating institutions,” said SACP Limpopo spokesperson Charlie Nkadimeng soon after the PEC meeting.
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He said while the issue rests squarely with the ANC leadership, the communists were more than confident that the appointments will be reversed as that was one of the critical issues the people of Limpopo want tackled.
“It’s not an issue of whether or not it will be done, it’s merely about when it is done and the type of the process involved.”
Nkadimeng said the ANC cannot afford to face the 2024 elections with such an embarrassing albatross around its neck. He said in an endeavour to fare well at the polls, the party needed to win back the confidence of the electorates or stand to regret.
The marching order by the SACP was echoed by the Bolsheviks Party, which is one of the opposition parties in the Sekhukhune district municipal council and the most expressive against the VBS municipal investments.
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The district comprises four local municipalities – Fetakgomo Tubatse, Makhuduthamaga, Elias Motsoaledi and Ephraim Mogale. Seun Mogotji is the general secretary of the party.
He told The Citizen yesterday that Fetakgomo Tubatse lost R350 million to VBS. The person allegedly responsible for the loss of the money, he said, was promoted to the position of ANC chief whip in Sekhukhune.
He alleged Ephraim Mogale lost R80 million and the person allegedly responsible for the loss was promoted to become a member of the mayoral committee in the same municipality.
Makhuduthamaga mayor, Mogotji claimed, invested R300 million in VBS. The money was, however, later recovered. But the mere fact that the council participated in the questionable transaction “means she should be held accountable as she contravened a very important Act – the Municipal Finance Management Act.
“Instead, the ANC in the region made her an acting regional chairperson after Julia Mathebe stepped aside following her arrest over the same debacle – the VBS investment.”
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He said as long as those tasked with a job to deal with the matter were selective in punishing the culprits, Limpopo must forget about getting closure on the VBS saga. More than 15 municipalities had invested about R1.5 billion with VBS against Treasury warnings not to do so.
During the recent ANC national working committee’s (NEC) visit to Limpopo, secretary-general Fikile Mbalula said the VBS saga was a serious matter that needed urgent attention.
Mbalula said the matter would be dealt with at national level and that it would form part of the discussions at the party’s next NEC meeting.
– news@citizen.co.za
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