Jordaan all set to be elected mayor today
TODAY is D-Day for Safa boss Danny Jordaan as scores of people, including government ministers and ANC heavyweights, will pack Port Elizabeth’s Nangoza Jebe Hall in New Brighton to witness his much-anticipated election as Nelson Mandela Bay mayor.
The election is a crucial moment for the ANC as it will indicate whether or not its choice of Jordaan as mayor has the blessing of all its members in council.
Among guests set to witness the proceedings are cabinet ministers Nomvula Mokonyane, Fikile Mbalula, Nosiviwe Mapisa-Nqakula and Pravin Gordhan.
Opposition parties will not attend today’s meeting, saying they refuse to be part of what they term an ANC rally. They also hope the ANC caucus is so divided that some councillors will either not show up or not vote for Jordaan when called on to do so.
The ANC will be hoping to get all 62 of its councillors to the meeting to elect a new executive, which will also include Bicks Ndoni as deputy mayor and Litho Suka as chief whip. It needs 61 votes for a quorum.
Yesterday, all ANC councillors turned up at the party’s caucus meeting at its regional headquarters, Florence Matomela House, where they were addressed by some of the national leaders.
The mood was jubilant as they sang and danced when the meeting ended.
Gordhan, Mbalula and Mokonyane also attended the caucus, along with
Jordaan and ANC regional task team convener Charles Nqakula.
There has been speculation that a disgruntled group of ANC members are lobbying behind the scenes for a boycott of the meeting.
But those councillors opposition parties are hoping will do so said there was no way they would not pitch up and defend the ANC.
ANC national spokesman Zizi Kodwa said a team of national organisers had been in the Bay for some time and the party’s national working committee would be back on Monday to meet branch clusters.
“We are fearless that all councillors of the ANC will be at the meeting. We’re rejuvenating this municipality . . . and the sense we got is that all councillors are up to the task. We’re confident we’ll have the numbers.”
Mokonyane said the branches of the ANC were excited about today’s proceedings .
ANC Eastern Cape secretary Oscar Mabuyane said: “The ANC is the majority in the council. The council meeting will continue with or without opposition parties.”
About an hour earlier, at the DA’s provincial head office in Central, the DA, UDM and COPE said the ruling party needed their help to get enough votes to elect Jordaan today.
DA caucus leader councillor Retief Odendaal said: “We have been approached by numerous councillors who have indicated their extreme unhappiness at the current changes within the ANC local structures and who are prepared to go so far as to support a DA candidate for the position of mayor.
“As confident as the DA is that we could win such a contest and as tempting as this is for us as the official opposition within Nel- son Mandela Bay, we cannot risk an unstable government for the people of [the] Bay.
“Tomorrow [today] Danny Jordaan will face a tough test. We are concerned though, to learn that he is apparently scheduled to fly to Zurich tomorrow to attend a Fifa congress in his capacity as head of Safa. This reaffirms that Danny Jordaan can only be a part-time mayor for Nelson Mandela Bay.”
Kodwa said there was nothing wrong with Jordaan fulfilling his obligations as Safa president. “What’s wrong with him going if he’s got no government obligations? The problem is Danny’s character has blown in their faces and they just can’t handle it,” he said.
This comes as Fifa has responded to the DA’s shadow minister of sports and recreation Solly Malatsi’s query about whether or not accepting the mayoral job meant that Jordaan was contravening Fifa rules.
Fifa secretary Jerome Valcke said Jordaan’s political role did not constitute a breach of Fifa’s code of ethics.
UDM councillor Mongameli Bobani said they would not assist the ANC in “plunging the city into chaos”.
“We will not be part of an ANC celebration . . . We know the meeting won’t take place because they won’t have a quorum,” he said.
COPE caucus leader Khwezi Ntshanyana said it was unfortunate that a respectable man like Jordaan would accept the mayoral job for the next 10 months.
Meanwhile, speaker Maria Hermans has defended her decision to hold the meeting at Nangoza Jebe, instead of the Wool Exchange council chambers in Military Road.
She said she had received numerous requests from the public to attend the meeting and the council chambers were too small.