The Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) in KwaZulu-Natal says all their deputy mayors, who served in coalitions with the IFP, have resigned.
EFF chairperson in KwaZulu-Natal, Mongezi Twala says their councilors were instructed to resign from their deputy mayor posts with immediate effect.
“Through the bilateral talks the organization had with the IFP we had to work with them in quite a number of municipalities in KZN whereby we are working with them in eighteen municipalities in KZN and but to be precise we had eight deputy mayors who have since furnished their resignation letters across those eight municipalities. We had deputy mayors, we have it in good authority they have taken us into confidence that they have resigned and also submitted their resignation letters.”
Last week, EFF leader Julius Malema announced that the coalition agreement between the EFF and the IFP had collapsed.
Meanwhile, a political analyst believes the failure of the EFF-IFP coalition will harm both parties. Municipal councils in Mtubatuba, the Zululand District, and uMhlathuze are expected to be affected.
Twala has revealed that the EFF wanted to lead one of the province’s economic hubs, the Umhlathuze municipality in Richards Bay in northern KwaZulu-Natal, that the IFP would not part with.
A similar admission was made by IFP president, Velenkosini Hlabisa when he addressed the media in Durban earlier this week.
“We wanted exactly to govern Umhlathuze municipality because we want to resuscitate that municipality. We want to rescue that municipality but also the people of KZN will soon learn that the most corrupt organization in KZN is the IFP at Umhlathuze. We came into talks with them to say look, you are governing one of the two economic hubs of KZN in particular the Newcastle and Umhlathuze municipality, so give us one economic hub as well which they refused.”
‘Disruptions’
Political analyst, Professor Bheki Mngomezulu, says the failure of the EFF and IFP’s coalition in KwaZulu-Natal will negatively impact both parties.
“IFP definitely is going to disrupt its programs in terms of the municipalities where the IFP is governing together with the EFF and therefore this might cause slight disruptions but then on the side of the EFF, this will also have a negative impact in terms of the trust. The fact that the EFF was able to ditch the ANC on the grounds that they were saying the ANC people are liars and also they are thieves then they went to the IFP, can the EFF be trusted going forward that once they have made a commitment then they will stick to it.”
The EFF in KwaZulu-Natal maintains that the end of their working relationship with the IFP does not automatically mean they will look to form coalitions with the ANC.
The party says they are in negotiations with other parties to find a way forward in the hung municipalities.
