Opposition parties in the North West have welcomed the Provincial Executive Council’s decision to disband the Lichtenburg-based Ditsobotla Local Municipal Council.
Premier, Bushy Maape took the decision at a special meeting in Mahikeng on Wednesday night.
The municipal council is reportedly dysfunctional and unable to execute its constitutional obligations.
The National Treasury has withheld R300-million of the council’s equitable share. The situation which is attributed to both political and administrative infighting has negatively affected the delivery of basic services.
The Democratic Alliance’s Freddy Sonakile and the Freedom Front’s deputy leader De Wet Nel, say the decision is long overdue.
“Remember since November 2021, the Ditsobotla municipality has never sat a full proper council meeting that sat and discussed service delivery issues. It has always been the factions of the ANC playing out. They spend most of their time in courts fighting for whose the legitimate municipal managers, speaker and all of that, and it even became a war zone”, says Sonakile
“We think it’s a good thing. The reason why we think it’s a good thing is because if you look at what happened in Ditsobotla in the recent past, it’s a total mess. The factional fighting, they had at one stage, two executive mayors there, two speakers. Nothing is functioning. People are suffering. There is no service delivery”, says Nel.
DA Statement on the disbanded municipality:
DA reacts to decision to dissolve the embattled Ditsobotla Local Municipality by the North West Provincial Government.
Read statement here:https://t.co/EXV2ZjSPnV
— DA North West (@DANorthWestNews) September 15, 2022
