Tshwane metro placed under administration amid council chaos

Gauteng provincial government has placed the City of Tshwane under administration amid a “number of governance failures”.

Gauteng human settlements and cooperative governance MEC Lebogang Maile made the announcement on Friday.

“Since the start of the term of office in 2016, there have been numerous cases of the collapse of council meetings, wherein the municipal council could not complete the business of council owing to violence erupting in the council chamber, various spurious motions of no confidence and total disrespect for the rules and order of council, which have created institutional instability and malfunctioning within the municipality,” Maile said.

“Based on the material facts as presented above, the Gauteng provincial executive council has been left with no choice but to invoke the provisions of section 139(1), read together with section 154, of the Constitution, by taking appropriate steps to support and strengthen the capacity of the City of Tshwane.”

This comes just a day after the DA was removed from power in the City of Tshwane.

On Thursday, two motions of no confidence resulted in both Tshwane council speaker Katlego Mathebe and mayor Stevens Mokgalapa being ousted.

Acting city manager Moeketsi Ntsimane will now be in control of the city until council sits again to elect Mokgalapa’s successor.

Initially it seemed as though the ANC would claim its second city from the DA in the space of two days. The governing party snatched Johannesburg on Wednesday when Geoff Makhubo won a majority 137 votes. However, Thursday’s anarchy threw a spanner in the works.

“As recently as yesterday, the level of instability that the coalition arrangement had introduced to governance within the City of Tshwane was laid bare for all to see, with motions of no confidence being brought against both the speaker and mayor in a council sitting that had elements of unruliness and disorder, which have become all too common in Tshwane,” Maile said.

The EFF has been punting the idea of nominating its own candidate for mayoral duties. However, while the city is under administration, the provincial government will be calling the shots.

Early this week, Gauteng Premier David Makhura and Maile announced that should the two metros fail to sort out their political mayhems then provincial government would step in, following the postponement of a council sitting in Tshwane and a breakdown in proceedings in Johannesburg last week.

“We will not allow political games on matters that fundamentally affect the lives of millions of Gauteng residents. It is time for swift and decisive action where there is governance or service delivery failure.

“There is administration and governance chaos in the city and all surveys point to the fact that service delivery has taken a deep knock and residents are suffering. There is a total mismanagement of the city, which has eroded public confidence,” Makhura said.

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