If you think divorce is messy, just try politics.
It all started as one big, happy family until a faction of the ruling party was expelled for siding with opposition parties in a vote of no confidence in the mayor of the time. The ANC later extended an olive branch, but the dissidents chose not to accept it.
Of all those who contested the by-elections as independents, Stone Mahlabe was the only one who retained his ward. Why? Because, in the 15 years that he has been their councillor, he has always had their best interest at heart. He has never skipped a meeting and he has taken every identified problem to the top. Unfortunately, however, like children caught up in the crossfire of the worst kind of divorce, the community of ward 26 appears to be suffering for their loyalty. Speaking to people in his ward last month, it was clear that they were not happy with the state of play. One person wanted to know why councillors from other wards come into their ward to communicate with them.
“Who are these people? We don’t know them. We only know Stone,” says one, clearly annoyed. Mahlabe says he knows of four occasions that outsiders have gate-crashed his ward, allegedly mandated by the mayor, Kgotso Khumalo, without his consent or knowledge. Just before the elections last year, ANC-clad people ‘randomly’ handed out paraffin stoves, while others looked on, surprised.
Mahlabe is at pains to point out that these stoves were purchased with community money and were not a ‘gift’ from the ANC, as it would appear. Just the other day, another group called community members together and announced that 50 households would be relocated to Marikana. The next day they were back, this time to gather information about the possible beneficiaries. Mahlabe denies any knowledge of proposed relocations.
Meanwhile, 45-year-old Sibongile Julia Mnanzana, a single mom in a wheelchair, wants none of it. Marikana is far away from her 12-year-old’s school and the clinic. Even though she has been waiting for a stand for ten years, she does not have transport to get to these amenities. Her fellow community members want to know how households are selected for relocation. The remainder of the 700 households, that have been waiting for houses for years, suspect favouritism, based on factionalism. Most of those in ward 26 appear to regard the actions of the municipality with deep suspicion. When they first elected Mahlabe to represent them in the municipality on 5 December 2000, there was no infrastructure to speak of. Since then, he has diligently listened to their grievances and requests and had taken them to the top. A large pile of correspondence is proof of every communication, for the benefit of the doubting Thomases out there. They see the developments as part of an agenda to discredit him.
“Why has the service delivery suddenly dried up? The last time the mayor was here in person was 3 weeks before the elections. He said he would come back two weeks after voting day, but we are still waiting. Empty promises – since 2014 we have only been getting empty promises. We don’t care about their fighting, it is none of our business. We just want stands.
Mahlabe uses the state of the roads to illustrate his frustrations. He has attended every IDP meeting and made sure that the improvement of the virtually non-existent roads in Extension 7 were prioritised in 2013. When he later queried why nothing had been done, he was told that they were not included in the document. He points to a slab of concrete that was laid in 2005 – just one of several that gave hope of RDP houses. Sadly, that was where it stayed, even though the contractor lives in Mahlabe’s ward, just 300 metres from his front doorstep. Could this be a deliberate attempt to discredit him in the eyes of his community? In an effort to get answers on behalf of the community, radio stations and newspapers have tried in vain to ask the right questions over an extended period of time.
To date, the silence has been deafening. The past two weeks have been no exception.
