Calls are mounting for the embattled Thaba Chweu Municipality in Mashishing to be placed under administration. Opposition parties in the local council are calling on the provincial COGTA MEC, Mandla Msibi, to place the municipality under curatorship.
The municipality hasn’t had a municipal manager for almost two months now.
This comes after the municipal Council failed on numerous occasions to come up with a resolution to fill the vacant municipal manager’s position. It’s been almost a month now since the municipal workers downed tools, demanding that a municipal manager be appointed.
The position has been vacant since early this year when the contract of former municipal manager Siphiwe Matsi ended.
Democratic Alliance (DA) Chief Whip Comfort Sibiya says the lack of political will to employ a municipal manager has negatively affected service delivery.
“The impact is very negative, and we are seeing it almost every day in terms of service delivery. I’ve seen some pictures in town where there are sewage spillages that are literally running through the streets currently, and there’s nobody attending to them. The biggest problem we’re facing is the lack of political leadership within the institution; hence, as the democratic alliance, we have been calling for the institution to be put under administration.”
The Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) say their inputs have not been taken into consideration by the majority within the council, which lead to the collapse of operations within the municipality. EFF councillor Jimmy Mosuthu says the Thaba Chweu Council denied the residents their rights to have services.
“If there’s a focus and there’s a collective decision, that decision should be implemented. But by the look of things, it looks like there’s no agreement internally when it comes to decision-making. There are those groups that don’t allow the process to go. There are those that say the municipality must have it, and that’s where the situation puts us today because we are stuck on the decision, we have agreed in council to say they must appoint one of the workers who qualify, but the ANC denied it.”
Services brought to a halt
Services at the municipality have been brought to a halt since the workers affiliated with the South African Municipal Workers (Samwu) downed tools. Community members are unable to pay for rates and taxes.
Samwu shop steward Charlie Maphanga says there are qualified individuals who can manage the beleaguered municipality.
“It can’t be correct that a municipality operates without an accounting officer. We have met the MEC several times, but up to this point there’s been no conclusive agreement to that effect, so it’s up to them. As Samwu, we are waiting on the side-lines to be given instructions so that we are able to deliver what we are employed to do, as our core mandate is service delivery.”
Calls for calm
The Mpumalanga Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs Department (GOGTA) has called for calm in the Thaba Chweu Municipality to allow the process of employing an acting municipal manager to unfold.
COGTA’s Head of Department, Samkelo Ngubane, says the unrest in Thaba Chweu is motivated by certain people within to make the institution ungovernable. Ngubane says they are engaging with the municipality.
“We are very much concerned about this; hence I’m calling for them to be as calm as possible because the action may be defiling without being reasonable because what we prefer, obviously, is to have a process for selecting a person who shall occupy that position on a permanent basis, and that is when the recruitment processes have been finalised. We prefer not to jump on an action of last resort like putting the municipality under administration.”
GOGTA says the person it seconded to the municipality to act as a municipal manager qualifies to hold the position until the recruitment processes are concluded.
