Ratepayers to fight for KSD in 2016 election
ONE of the Eastern Cape’s most troubled councils is facing a challenges from its own ratepayers. The Mthatha Ratepayers’ and Residents’ Association (MR RA) is planning to contest 2016 local government elections in the King Sabata Dalindyebo municipal area.
The association’s entrance into the highly contested arena is expected to increase pressure on parties vying for votes ahead of the elections.
The MRRA, with its 4 000 members, will join the EFF in contesting the KSD elections for the first time.
MRRA spokesman Madyibi Ngxekana said the association had raised service delivery issues with the municipality including the appalling state of roads – but to no avail.
He said what made matters worse was the disregard shown by the municipality for ratepayers’ concerns over property values determined in 2014’s general valuation.
Ngxekana said ratepayers were now paying double what they paid before 2014 due to values that had sky-rocketed.
“When we wrote a letter inviting the municipality to a meeting to explain to us the issue of rates, one councillor said he was not accountable to us.
“We took that response to the general meeting and we said we should go to the people on the ground and we came to the conclusion that if these people do not care about us and are not accountable to us, we should contest the elections.
“We then invited the IEC [Independent Electoral Commission] to empower us on how to go about registering.”
The council has an ANC majority with the UDM, DA and the Civic Alliance of South Africa making up the rest. In the 2009 general elections the ANC gained 73 940 votes which dropped to 68 414 in last year’s general poll.
The UDM registered 9 000 more votes compared with 2009.
Ngxekana said the MRRA planned to contest nine wards and residents of each ward would decide on candidates.
MRRA member Ralph Mini said the association planned to contest in all local municipalities in the O R Tambo district. “Other towns such as Matatiele, Bizana, Flagstaff, Lusikisiki and Nyandeni are also having similar problems as us,” he said.
The MRRA is not the first ratepayers’ association to follow this route. In Sterkspruit, the town’s ratepayers’ association-turned-civic-organisation will also contest the local government elections for the first time next year.
In Grahamstown, an organisation known as Keep Grahamstown Grahamstown contested the local government elections in 2011 under the name Makana Independent New Deal and took two seats on the Makana council.
ANC provincial secretary Oscar Mabuyane said the MRRA’s stance was “concerning”. He said the ANC would look to meet with the body.
KSD mayor Nonkoliso Ngqongwa said the municipality had a service delivery master plan to deal with all service delivery related concerns.