‘Irregular’ council decisions challenged

Tempers flared during the council meeting on October 15 as yet another vote of no confidence in the Mayor, Afzul Rehman and a number of issues regarding
municipal spending came under contention.

On August 27, Council degraded into a shouting match between political parties, resulting in a staged walkout conducted by opposition parties.

During the most recent council meeting on October 15, opposition councillors raised issues regarding decisions taken by Council after the walkout.

One of the most disconcerting issues raised, was the approval of the 6.79 percent salary adjustments of the municipal manager, Kebone Masange and the employees
directly accountable to him, applicable from July 1 2014.

This was followed by an added 10 percent being paid on the performance bonuses of the municipal manager and 57 other managers working with him.

The factor that pushed the opposition councillors to leave the meeting, had been the Department of Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs (CoGTA) report on the municipality.

Opposition parties believed they could not discuss the matter in council, simply because they had not been given hard copies of the report to discuss and deliberate on in their respective caucus meetings.

However, decisions regarding these issues were taken, although the opposition had left the council. “There was no quorum in council! How could these decisions have been taken? This is the people’s money we are using to pay these monies. We can’t approve such a thing, when it was not even discussed in council. This matter was
supposed to be discussed in committee, but it never made it that far, because we walked out and the quorum was lost,”challenged National Freedom Party (NFP) cuncillor, Sibusiso Lukele.

This challenge sparked a range of debates from ANC councillors, and the standing rules of order regarding council were brought into question.

According to the standing rules of council, quorum means the minimum number of councillors or other members if any, who must be present at a meeting before it may commence or continue with business.

Taking this into consideration would suggest that if at the start of the meeting the quorum had been met, then all decisions taken after the councillors had left, were still applicable.

“You must understand how these processes work. The opposition left, and lost their right to submit a counter proposal. We moved for the decisions of EXCO regarding
these matters to be adopted by council. Since this motion did not receive any opposition, due to the councillors leaving, it was adopted as the resolution of council.

These walkout policies must come to an end,” said Cllr Rehman. Citing the De Vries vs Edenvale Municipality case of 30 April 2009, Fedcon Councillor, Alex Liu explained that the quorum of the municipality had to be met for decisions to be taken, and by leaving the meeting, the quorum had been lost.

“The moment the councillors walked out, the quorum of council ceased. The quorum is never static. After the walkout, if the 31 councillors for quorum in this council are not present, then any resolution taken thereafter was null and void,” explained Councillor Ben Vorster.

Cllr Lukele thereafter brought forward a Point Of Order (POA) regarding the standing rules of order of the municipality, which reads, “If during a meeting there is
a walkout, the speaker must allow a five minute interval, and councillors must be counted to see if quorum is maintained.”

This did not happen, suggesting that whatever decisions taken by council after the walkout, were irregular and unethical.

Shouting matches resumed at this point, with opposition parties giving each other tongue-lashings. Eventually, Speaker of Council, Mandla Zikhali closed all discussions on the matter, which provided no real resolution for the matters at hand.

Thereafter, Inkatha Freedom Party Councillor, Thami Ntzuza brought forward his motion to Council of a vote of no confidence in the mayor. Having the backing of all opposition parties helped Cllr Ntzuza in no way as Cllr Zikhali deemed his motion out of order.

Legal advisor to the municipality, Makhosini Nkosi, was asked to motivate Cllr Zikhali’s decision. Mr Nkosi explained: “The speaker does not need to give any explanation for his decision.

There is no definition for the phrase ‘out of order’. The speaker used his rights in the right manner.” Cllr Ntzuza thereafter challenged the fact that the motion had made it onto the agenda of council meeting, but it was now deemed as ‘out of order’.

He questioned why the speaker allowed this motion onto the agenda, but it was shut down before Council could vote on the matter.

A confidential source explained that according to the rules regulating Council and the municipality, the decisions taken by Council after the walkout on August 27 were irregular, and required further investigation.