COUNCIL sources have confirmed that Dr Vusumuzi Mthembu has been recommended for the position of municipal manager at AbaQulusi municipality.
All three members of the recruitment selection panel unanimously agreed that he is the most qualified person for the post.
The AbaQulusi council is now awaiting approval from Cogta (Department of Co-operative Governance and Tradition Affairs) MEC, Nomusa Ncube-Dube, before it can make an appointment. If all goes well, Dr Mthembu may be appointed before the end of the year.
This is not the first time that Dr Mthembu has applied for this position in AbaQulusi.
He was appointed as the municipal manager in 2012, having been selected by a panel made up of four political parties represented in the council.
Despite remaining in the position for two years, he was never given the opportunity to carry out his duties, as the MEC first refused to confirm his appointment, and then took to court to block his appointment, saying that he had misrepresented his credentials on his CV, and that the Executive Council (Exco) meeting in which Dr Mthembu’s appointment was confirmed, was unprocedural, as the Mayor was not there.
Harry Heyns, who represented the DA on Exco at the time when Dr Mthembu was appointed in 2012, insists that the MEC’s intervention was nothing short of a political ploy that cost AbaQulusi ratepayers.
In August 2014, it was reported in the Vryheid Herald that Dr Mthembu had been spending his working days in his car in a parking space at the municipality after being refused access to his office.
He had also not been paid his salary for months.
This week, ANC spokesperson, Zakes Buthelezi said, “We (the ANC) know that Dr Mthembu has been shortlisted. The fact that the IFP and its coalition parties have selected him does not come as a surprise. It does not surprise us that they would have two criminals working together to run the municipality, a corrupt mayor and a lying MM.”
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