DA’s Cilliers Brink elected as City of Tshwane mayor

Democratic Alliance (DA) councillor Cilliers Brink has been elected the new executive mayor of the City of Tshwane.

Brink beat newly sworn-in Congress of the People (Cope) councillor Ofenste Moalusi by 109 to 102 votes.

The metropolitan municipality convened a special meeting in the Tshwane House on Tuesday to vote for a new mayor after failing to do so on two previous occasions.

Cope‘s former councillor and Tshwane speaker, Dr Murunwa Makwarela, was previously elected to the mayoral position, but resigned on 10 March after it emerged that he forged his insolvency rehabilitation certificate.

‘Blind eye on transgressions’

Before the voting could start the African National Congress (ANC) and Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) refused to take part in the process until action was taken against the DA over the “69 ballots” saga.

Two weeks ago, the DA instructed its 69 councillors to mark ballots with allocated numbers in order to identify which candidate they voted for during the election of the speaker, which took place via secret ballot.

The Electoral Commission of South Africa (IEC), however, ruled that the party’s move violated its voting guidelines and declared all 69 votes as spoilt ballots.

The EFF, which opened a case against the DA last week, asked council speaker Mncedi Ndzwanana on Tuesday to address the matter before the voting process “as we cannot go ahead as if it’s business as usual”.

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“No one has the right to discipline anyone assuming that the person has voted for person A or B on a secret ballot. Why is that thing called a secret ballot? You go to the voting booth alone and whatever that happens there you are defended and protected by the Constitution.

“This council must know that every time when [we vote via] secret ballot there are some parties that victimise their members,” Tshwane EFF chairperson Obakeng Ramabodu said on Tuesday.

“We want to expose in court that they don’t defend the Constitution… they do it willingly. They have turned the Constitution into an Holiday Inn [because] they check in when it suits them and check out when they don’t want to use it.”

ANC councillor Moses Maluleke shared the same sentiments.

“We can’t put a blind eye on transgressions and tremble of the Constitution and its municipal statutes. We need to take actions against those councillors because we can’t proceed with legal delinquents,” Maluleke said.

The ANC-EFF alliance reversed its decision to nominate Pan Africanist Congress of Azania (PAC) councillor Molwantwa Tshabadi as the preferred mayoral candidate.

‘Fraudulent activities’

Meanwhile, Ramabodu also raised concern over Monday afternoon’s events in Tshwane House.

“The city manager must tell us what are the consequences of the meeting he called [which saw] people engage in fraudulent activities. They must be investigated… they can’t be left just like that,” he said.

Ndzwanana in his response indicated that the matter “will be attended to in due course”.

The speaker on Monday adjourned the city’s council sitting, which was expected to vote on a motion of no confidence against him, claiming it was illegal.

The sitting was called by the city manager, Johann Mettler, after Ndzwanana, according to the DA-led multi-party coalition, refused to allow a vote on the motion.

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Mettler convened the meeting in line with a provision in the Municipal Structures Act, which empowers the city manager to convene a meeting in the event that a majority of councillors sign a petition calling for it.

At least 108 councillors had to be in support of calling the meeting for the request to be accepted.

However, in a twist of events on Monday, Ndzwanana revealed that the coalition partners allegedly submitted a petition to call for the council sitting with questionable signatures.

ActionSA national chairperson Michael Beaumont has since confirmed that the party will head to court to contest Ndzwanana’s decision.

In a video shared on social media, Beaumont said the adjournment was another ploy by the ANC and EFF to prevent the multi-party coalition from governing the city.