It has now dawned on our administered eMalahleni municipality to fish in competent hands for municipal manager. Tabloids are flashing out and computer mice navigating and scrolling for aspirant eMalahleni incumbents for this new advertised vacancy for the Municipal Manager, whose key responsibilities include amongst others, to promote transformation.
Regrettably some will find this vacancy long closed and sealed on the eighth instant. Not enough time for that squatter camp vibrant candidate to squeeze in before deployment or nepotic comrade steps in. Could it be a formality under scrutiny and watchful gatekeepers?
eMalahleni community will have to guard the guardians to alley fears of a ‘ja-baas’ to this critical and strategic position of service delivery. Protests are no solutions.
We have in our hands a once off lifetime opportunity (correctly put a five-year contract) to grab and seal off this vacancy before outside administrative miners, just as we have outside coal miners rushing into a no-man’s land eMalahleni.
It is not only an indictment to the eMalahleni community not to produce and secure a municipal manager, not to mention a provincial premier. It will be an answerable judgement at a disgruntled future youth tribunal.
A recent furore surrounding the Emalahleni Administrator emanated from a local political group that once ushered praise singers to the incumbent but now usher moaning tears to non-delivered promises.
Some reminisced on the provincially most qualified and competent predecessor eMalahleni ever had (George Mthimunye), that the currently applied office security measures if engineered, could have delivered a different eMalahleni by now.
Whosoever takes the reign, faces a retributive ire of the community on service delivery, high level of violence and crime, blatant corruption, recent sporadic uprisings from different recalcitrant quarters and mind boggling accounting system that imposes new rates without consultation with affected ratepayers
Whoever takes the reign needs all stakeholder associations more than before. From taxi, legal, labour, civic, religious, big and small business, cultural, educational, economic and mining chambers. The current jobless youth violence remains the biggest challenge to Emalahleni.
It remains a misnomer and a contradiction to locals to utter the word ‘unemployment’ when the whole Africa converges to eMalahleni for ‘job opportunities’ which they secure. Who is fooling who here?
To rid of this civil inertia, consultation and an open door policy will inevitably bring the Municipal Manager into a squatter camp shack and experience suffering face to face. Our constitution is praised as pro-poor.
The role of the Ratepayers Association is more relevant than before. Its strength lies in its visibility participation in the community.
Whosoever takes the reign will reinforce the office with key performers who will save millions with this municipality. City Mechanical and Civil Engineer, City Electrical Engineer to monitor on quality and fair deliverables to rid off the self imposed, self preserved, self abracadabra word pothole in our dictionaries.
Local municipal elections are knocking at our doors. Woe to us to nominate the only one we know can only pass a vote of thanks at the graveyard whilst he is not commenting about the blackjacks targeting his/her expensive apparel to stick on.
Woe to us to target the only cheque collector who we know battled to get a Grade R certificate. Yes, he/she is connected. This is because the qualified professional academia and skilled community leaders have turned a blind eye and crawled into cocoons to avoid being purged by this cruel politics of the have-nots.
Woe to us the day we correlate, compile and diarise with chronological accuracy the eMalahleni journey of transformation, city development, twitter on its rise and economic fall, will show heaps of rubble from a disgruntled and violent society.
Do you see a light in the long dark tunnel?
It is about time!!!