With Nelson Mandela Bay having forfeited more than R1bn in unspent grants over the years, MPs were left stunned as co-operative governance MEC Zolile Williams faced tough questions over the worsening governance and appeals for support.
Williams had to account for the state of affairs in the metro earlier this week.
The damning indictment confounded MPs as the metro is ever turning to higher spheres of government for support as governance falters.
Williams revealed this while the national department unveiled a 10-member Section 154 support team tasked with dragging Nelson Mandela Bay back from the brink.
“Your city — speaker, and mayor and councillors — is haemorrhaging resources that are being deployed by government to Nelson Mandela Bay,” Williams said.
“My colleagues in parliament were saying: ‘MEC, Nelson Mandela Bay, in our calculation, has lost about a billion back to the national fiscus’.
“This is a pain to us as the provincial government.”
The team — comprising specialists in financial management, infrastructure, supply chain, municipal public accounts committee and contract oversight — was introduced by co-operative governance deputy minister Dr Namane Dickson Masemola.
It follows mayor Babalwa Lobishe’s request for Section 154 support to stabilise the collapsing administration.
Masemola said the National Treasury had analysed the metro’s finances, unauthorised, irregular, fruitless and wasteful expenditure exposure, internal controls, audit action plan and the performance of the municipal public accounts committee, concluding that Nelson Mandela Bay needed urgent, specialised support.
He said the intervention was not a replacement of the city’s administration or a backdoor to invoke Section 139.
However, if the support failed, Section 139 would kick in, which allowed for provincial intervention in struggling municipalities, which could ultimately result in the dissolution of the municipal council as a final measure
The co-operative governance and traditional affairs (Cogta) department would fund the team.
It must produce a turnaround strategy and two reports by March, overseen by a political committee co-chaired by Masemola, Williams and Lobishe.
But instead of welcoming the intervention, councillors across the political spectrum turned their anger on Cogta.
DA councillor Rano Kayser accused Williams of arriving three years too late.
“You come and stand here with a straight face and think we must accept it — but it is three years too late, Sir.
“The crisis in this municipality is in the office of the accounting officer,” he said.
GOOD councillor Lawrence Troon questioned why acting city manager Lonwabo Ngoqo was not being given time to stabilise the administration before outside intervention.
“Why can the acting city manager not be given that opportunity to work a little bit longer?” he asked, accusing Cogta of ignoring other collapsing municipalities.
“Enoch Mgijima, Makana, Buffalo City — all are falling apart, and there is no Section 154 there.
“I am not convinced this is about good governance.
“This is the only functioning municipality in the Eastern Cape, and I believe this is an attempt to fool whoever stands in the way of those who want to loot the resources of this municipality.”
EFF councillor Zanele Sikawuti cast doubt on Cogta’s track record.
“We’ve got 30 municipalities under 154, and only two have shown improvement,” she said.
“How will this help us? How will this not create friction where the council will be relinquished of its powers?”
Williams hit back at Kayser, insisting the province had attempted to intervene — including pushing for a collective executive system, which he said parties rejected.
“Lies have short legs,” he said.
“I’ve been with this municipality for the past three years because I saw a crisis beginning.
“I started engaging the former mayor, Retief Odendaal … and the ultimate end was to push for a Section 12 intervention.”
This ended up in court.
Masemola, meanwhile, dismissed claims that Nelson Mandela Bay was being singled out.
“There is a team in Makana. We have been to Buffalo City,” he said.
“There was an intervention at Enoch Mgijima, and we received a close-out report.”
The Herald
