Town in limbo as EFF infighting stalls council
SHUT DOWN: Nquthu municipality this week THE man holding the Nquthu council to ransom is not in Nquthu.
He is hiding out in the KwaZulu-Natal Midlands because he does not feel safe in his hometown, the only one in South Africa still without a mayor.
Councillor S’ne Ntshangase — currently suspended from the EFF — is the kingmaker in Nquthu, where his vote may determine whether the ANC or a rival coalition led by the Inkatha Freedom Party will govern.
But he has been hoofed out of the EFF because of infighting and while that drama plays out in court, nothing is happening in the small town in rural northern KwaZulu-Natal.
In the Nquthu municipality, the IFP has 15 seats to the ANC’s 14. The National Freedom Party has two and the EFF and DA have one seat apiece.
The IFP needs the EFF and the DA to edge out an ANC/NFP coalition.
Ntshangase declined to speak to the Sunday Times this week, citing the conditions of his suspension.
He did say, however, that he was “afraid because every IFP, EFF and DA councillor in Nquthu is being guarded, hence I left town”.
The IFP and EFF — suspicious of Ntshangase who they believe could sell them out and vote with the ANC (his former party) — tried to replace him with EFF regional chairman Malibongwe Mdletshe, a former IFP strongman.
The deadlock in the council has completely paralysed the municipality.
Five attempts to constitute the 33member council have failed.
The town has no mayor, no deputy mayor, no speaker and no chief whip. No committees have been formed and municipal manager Bongi Gumbi has taken ill and been booked off for stress.
The council staff are so demoralised that some no longer come to work “because they do nothing since there’s no committee to take decisions”, said a junior manager at the municipality.
The municipality cannot procure services HIDING OUT: S’ne Ntshangase insists he is a bona fide EFF town councillor to maintain basic water delivery and waste disposal, and council trucks that need diesel cannot be filled because a budget cannot be approved.
Businessman and ANC mayoral candidate Lucky Moloi said nothing was happening in Nquthu.
The matter of Ntshangase’s suspension and replacement will be heard in the High Court in Pietermaritzburg on October 6.
In papers challenging his suspension, he argues that when Nquthu swore in its councillors he was also sworn in.
“After the inauguration of the new council members, the council meeting continued and during the course of the meeting the municipal manager, Bongi Gumbi, simply announced that I had to be replaced by the second respondent [Mdletshe] as a council member there and then.
“The second respondent simply took my place in the council chambers and I had to leave,” said Ntshangase.
KwaZulu-Natal’s co-operative governance MEC Nomusa Dube-Ncube confirmed she was considering what legal options were available to deal with the problems in Nquthu, which had prevented a council being formed not only in the town but also in the wider uMzinyathi district municipality. Comment on this: write to tellus@sundaytimes.co.za or SMS us at 33971 www.sundaytimes.co.za