MBDA to explain ‘lack of progress’

The Mandela Bay Development Agency (MBDA) will on Friday have to give a presentation on its performance and motivate why the board should not be replaced by the Nelson Mandela Bay council.

At the meeting with the city's political leadership, to be led by deputy mayor Thsonono Buyeye, the MBDA will have to explain why it failed to reach project targets in the 2016-17 financial year as well as the overall performance for the 2017-18 financial year.

Last week, ANC councillor and infrastructure and engineering head Andile Lungisa said the “underperforming MBDA board must go”.

Lungisa was speaking at a mayoral committee meeting and was backed by mayor Mongameli Bobani, who said everything must change with the new coalition government.

On Wednesday, Buyeye said the invitation had been extended to the MBDA, but it had yet to confirm its attendance.

Buyeye said items on the agenda for the day also included the MBDA’s recent organisational review, which saw executive positions added to the organogram, and the move to pay board members.

“The city aims to get insight into operations of the MBDA in order to ensure that targets and programmes as set in the service delivery agreement between the MBDA and [the municipality] are met,” Buyeye said.

He added the meeting was a mere oversight exercise.

“The city aims to get all the information pertaining to service delivery and budget expenditure.

“If there is anything that is not in order, the city aims to correct such things in order to keep the entity a well-oiled service delivery machine and [ensure]

Thsonono Buyeye

that the MBDA lives up to the mandate that it was created for,” Buyeye said.

Other political heads who are expected to be at the meeting include Queenie Pink, who is in charge of the economic development portfolio, Lehlonolo Mfana, who heads up the sports and recreation department, and budget and treasury political head Mkhuseli Mtsila.

The agency, which is governed under the Companies Act, is run by a board of directors as well as members of the Bay council and municipal officials who are called shareholder representatives.

To remove the board, the shareholder representatives need to give valid reasons, such as underperformance, and put it to a vote.

Thereafter, an annual general meeting would have to be held to communicate the decision to the board members.

This would ultimately have to be ratified by the council.

Lungisa declined to speak further on their plans to replace the board, saying what he said at last week’s mayoral committee meeting stood and he had nothing to add.

MBDA spokesperson Luvuyo Bangazi also declined to comment, but said if it received an invitation it would attend as it was legally obliged to do so.

“Unfortunately, the MBDA is not in a position to provide any comment on matters relating to NMBM member representative initiatives.

“These are matters that are exclusively in the parent municipality’s domain,” Bangazi said.

‘If there is anything that is not in order, the city aims to correct such things’

DEPUTY MAYOR