DA made a mess of crisis
THE letters “Who is funding write-offs?”, “Why it is necessary to hike water tariffs”, DA’s sly meddling with politics” and “Day Zero photos provide proof ”, by Peter Stenslunde (CRRA), DA leader Mmusi Maimane, George Hector and councillor Mark RH Kleinschmidt respectively, Cape Argus April 25, refers.
Stenslunde is correct: many of the councillors do not serve the interests of the people. They serve only their political masters and their over-bloated pay cheques.
Some do try their best, but they have bureaucracy to contend with.
Anyone who has received a message from the City’s contact us call centre will understand this.
Stenslunde asks some pertinent questions about the budget, but he will never get a straight answer from the authorities.
His association should try to invoke PAJA (The Promotion of Administrative Justice Act) and PAIA (Promotion of Access to Information Act), to get the answers he wants. The draft budget does not adhere to the principles of PAJA, which has at its core putting the people first.
Maimame has no mandate to get involved in local politics. But now that he is, he should instruct the DA in Cape Town to immediately get rid of all its consultants. According to dearcapetown, the organisation fighting the punitive tariffs proposed in the draft budget, Cape Town spends R6 billion on consultants. Maimane’s assertion that the City does not make a profit on the sale of water (and electricity) shows just how out of touch he is with reality. The Cape Chamber of Commerce will happily put him straight.
Hector got it wrong. Ian Neilson, not Ian Iversen is the deputy mayor, but his Et Tu Brutus analogy is correct. All politicians, whatever their allegiance, are happy to “kick a man when he is down”. In this case, Patricia de Lille who has no intention of going without a fight, even though the DA caucus has voted for the motion of no confidence against her. No matter that Kleinschmidt believes Day Zero was a reality.
It wasn’t, it was a publicity stunt dreamed up by a public relations consultancy to scare us into using less water. When Day Zero first became part of the public discourse an engineer told me it was never going to happen. So far he is right.
Meanwhile, residents who threaten to punish the DA at the ballot box next year have short memories. Who can forget Nomaindia Mfeketo’s disastrous reign as Cape Town’s ANC mayor.