The situation in the embattled Ditsobotla local municipality in Lichtenburg, North West, continues to be dire as lack of service delivery continues.
This was revealed when the municipality appeared before the North West provincial legislature’s portfolio committee on cooperative governance, human settlements and traditional affairs this week in Mahikeng.
According to the portfolio committee chairperson, Aaron Motswana, political intervention, maladministration, misappropriation of funds and corruption contributed to the demise of the municipality.
The municipality has allegedly spent more than R31-million, irregularly, excluding salaries.
The mayor has also been under siege for suspending senior municipal managers and appointing acting municipal managers without following proper procedures.
Recently, officials from the auditor-general’s office were also assaulted and prohibited from entering municipal buildings.
“The municipality is in distress and experiencing systemic dysfunctionality. There is also resistance to an intervention due to the hasty political interference in administrative issues. The instability at the municipality can be traced back to 2006,” said Motswana.
“There is also lawlessness at the municipality, where supply chain management issues are openly being discussed by councillors. The municipal council is also sitting on top of the public protector and forensic report findings that need to be implemented, but that is not happening.”
Motswana said he had received information from a whistleblower that some top politicians, who are members of the provincial legislature in the North West and MPs, are conniving with councillors to disrupt the municipality.
When pressed to reveal the names of those allegedly involved, Motswana said he needed to go through organisational processes to raise his dissatisfaction and would do so at the right time.
He also accused North West cooperative governance and traditional affairs MEC Lenah Miga of tailing to take action when problematic municipalities appear before the committee.
“We will write a letter to North West premier Bushy Maape requesting a proclamation from President Cyril Ramaphosa for the Special Investigating Unit to investigate malfeasance at the municipality,” he said.
The municipal speaker, Mpho Lekaba alleged that current instability at the municipality was caused by the mayor’s actions.
Lekaba, said the dismissed acting municipal manager has taken the matter to the high court for litigation and the mayor had already spent R179 162.62 on attorneys to defend the matter. “The council has had R31 117 669.29 expenditure since its inception, excluding salaries.”
The mayor was not available for comment as she is on sick leave.
Meanwhile, Miga’s spokesperson Tsholofelo Mathibedi said: “The municipality submission of the Section 71 reports is unsatisfactory and questionable. However, the provincial treasury and cooperative governance and traditional affairs are working on encouraging the municipal submission to improve.
“The department has confirmed that the appointment of the acting municipal manager by the mayor was not procedural, as the court pronounced.
“The department has advised the mayor to apologise to council and put an item on the council agenda to reverse all unprocedural appointments to normalise the situation.”
Mathibedi said Miga could not appear before the committee because she was conducting interviews for the appointment of the new head of department.
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