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Mpumalanga’s City of Mbombela politicians and officials are under fire for allegedly handpicking 47 individuals to be trained as traffic officers.
The 47 people were hurriedly interviewed on Monday in order to ensure that the municipality met a deadline to send them to the Mpumalanga Traffic College in Bushbuckridge.
City Press has been reliably told that the municipality advertised the posts in October last year, but did not shortlist and interview applicants then. The politicians and officials allegedly supplied a list of individuals to be considered – shutting out the unemployed members of the public.
Mbombela spokesperson, Joseph Ngala, declined to comment at this stage.
“The Economic Freedom Fighters has written to the municipality complaining about irregularities. We’ll respond to the EFF before we talk about this,” Ngala said.
City Press has seen the EFF’s letter to council speaker, Mandla Msibi.
“How best was the City of Mbombela recruitment policy followed as we’ve [got] information that councillors deployed by the ANC recruited in their respective wards from ANC members only?” wrote the party’s chief whip, Cosas Maseko.
“It [should] be noted that the recruitment policy of the City of Mbombela requires that all people within the city, the province and the country be given equal opportunity regardless of their political affiliation,” he added.
Maseko demanded that the interviews be stopped and that the recruitment process should be started afresh.
The interviews went ahead regardless.
EFF provincial leader, Collen Sedibe, said the party was preparing to apply for a court interdict against the municipality.
A source within the municipality who spoke anonymously to City Press confirmed that processes were not followed.
“They really messed up,” he said. “What were the reasons to go to selection and recruitment with a list? This confirms that the trainees were handpicked.”
This is not the first time that Mbombela politicians and officials have brazenly violated their own recruitment policies.
Read: Jobs for ANC cadres in Mbombela
In 2014, former municipal manager Noko Seanego and other officials were caught on audio and video recordings bulldozing the appointment of 30 ANC cadres as law enforcement officers. The South Municipal Workers Union lodged a dispute and the EFF laid charges.
According to documents, the municipality had advertised 16 law enforcement officer positions with an annual salary of R146 000 each. In the end, 30 people were employed at an additional cost of R2 million a year.
Panel chairperson Thamsanqa Khumalo allegedly handed panellists a list of about 40 ANC cadres from the party’s Ehlanzeni regional office to be shortlisted for interviews.
A union shopsteward, Mthokozi Mhlongo, was suspended after lodging a dispute and at that time he told City Press that his suspension letter was delivered by a busload of the newly employed cadres.
Ten candidates, who were not ANC members but passed the interviews, were given lower-paid jobs as security guards – earning R97 000 a year.
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