It was a day of drama and chaos inside eThekwini metro council chambers on Tuesday afternoon when the sitting was turned into a fist fight.
As the metro’s law-enforcement officers were called in to restore order in the council chambers, emotions ran high, which led to an exchange of blows between the officers and EFF councillors.
Councillors admitted to hospital
And when the dust had settled, some councillors had to be rushed to the hospital for medical treatment as a result of knocks they took during the fight.
The bloody feud was triggered by the stand-off between EFF councillors and council speaker Thabani Nyawose.
At the heart of the schism was the insistence by Nyawose to allow embattled city manager Musa Mbhele to sit in the meeting despite strong objections from the red berets.
EFF councillors led a charge that Mbhele should not attend the sitting on the grounds that he was implicated in some of the items which had been tabled for deliberations.
However, Nyawose would have none of that, insisting that EFF councillors be removed from the sitting for unruly behaviour.
On Wednesday, the EFF hit back, saying Nyawose should answer for the chaos.
“The speaker was behind what happened on Tuesday because we raised a motion that the city manager should not be present in the meeting,” said EFF spokesperson Mazwi Blose.
“Under his watch, the municipality could not spend R1.2-billion which was meant for sanitation and infrastructure and to assist flood victims.
“The money was sent back to National Treasury because the municipality could not spend it.”
EFF’s ‘unreasonable’ demands
Nyawose pointed out that the EFF was delusional and wanted to coerce the sitting into acceding to its “unreasonable” demands.
“The issue of the R1.2-billion was distorted to suit a particular narrative,” said Nyawose.
“The money that is being bandied about only came in March of this year and it has not been sent back to Treasury.
“There are currently discussions because National Treasury requested that it needed a certain portion of the money to plug certain gaps.
“The city manager explained to them that this was impossible because the municipal needed the funds to fulfil our own obligations. That’s where we’re at the moment.”
The ANC governs the only metro in KwaZulu-Natal through EFF partnership together with several smaller parties.
