‘Trollip is our man’
The Democratic Alliance-led coalition government in Nelson Mandela Bay is hanging in the balance, but said yesterday it was confident that a motion to remove mayor Athol Trollip and council speaker Jonathan Lawack would not succeed.
The DA has 57 seats, together with its coalition partners Cope and the African Christian Democratic Party, with one seat each.
At a press conference ahead of the vote today the DA stressed at length the service delivery successes it claims to have achieved under the leadership of Trollip.
Cope councillor Siyasanga Sijadu said while “Trollip is not everyone’s cup of tea”, they, as councillors, were not in their positions to drink tea, but to get on with providing services to the city.
The DA is expected to hold a picket outside Vuyisile Mini Square ahead of the the no-confidence debate.
It has also started a petition lobbying residents to support Trollip as the right man for the job.
DA provincial leader Nqaba Bhanga, accompanied by the entire mayoral committee team, said yesterday they supported Trollip and that the bid to have their members removed was initiated by power-hungry individuals: the Patriotic Alliance’s Marlon Daniels and United Democratic Movement former deputy mayor Mongameli Bobani.
Both Trollip and Lawack were not present at the briefing.
“It’s not about them, it’s about the bigger project to change South Africa. We have a collective of people who run this government in support of Trollip and Lawack. They have provided us with good leadership. Why should we turn our backs on them?” asked Bhanga.
Earlier this month, Daniels and Bobani served motions for the removal of Trollip and Lawack. Council chief whip Werner Senekal then filed a motion for the position of deputy mayor to be removed from the city’s administrative structure.
The Patriotic Alliance (PA) withdrew from the DAled coalition government in September, just three months after joining it. The PA threatened to terminate its agreement with the DA if Daniels was not elected as deputy mayor.
The Economic Freedom Fighters hold the decisive vote with six seats in the council. – ANA