Businesses and ratepayers give NCR their full support

Local businesses and residents have rallied to support the national cabinet representative (NCR) who apparently met with resistance from the local council in his quest to bring financial recovery to the Enoch Mgijima Local Municipality (EMLM).

Border Kei Chamber of Business (BKCOB), with the Civic Ratepayers’ Association of Enoch Mgijima (Craem), pledged their alliance with the NCR in a press statement they released on Wednesday.

The statement indicated that EMLM has been plagued by service delivery issues since 2016, and had been placed under three administrations, of which two had failed as a result of resistance.

However, this time the business sector and the ratepayers made it clear they were not prepared to witness yet another failed administrative intervention from the defiance of the local council which is allegedly fuelled by outside political interference.

The statement follows after a number of reports emerged that NCR Dr Monde Tom and his team, who were mandated to implement the National Treasury’s financial recovery plan, have been sidelined on some crucial decisions of the municipality.

One of the most recent include the unlawful contract extension of the municipal manager, the recent media spat and the appointment of a R24m security service provider when a local company offered to do it for R 6m, and the recent reports of overpaid employees.

Another incident the two organisations were not happy with was the public spat which erupted between EMLM management and the NCR following reports of some employees receiving overpayment of salaries.

“The previous two administrative interventions both failed due to the absolute disregard and defiance of the administrative process by local council, supported by outside political interference,” the statement read.

“However, continued acts of defiance by local councils as experienced by previous administrations continues to prevail.

“This rebellious behaviour is being propagated by the ruling party, who continue to vote in opposition to most, if not all, council resolutions proposed to assist the NCR team in their implementation of the financial recovery plan.

“The Komani branch of the Border Kei Chamber of Business and Civic Ratepayers Association of Enoch Mgijima are in full support of the mandate of the NCR, and are willing to do anything and everything to create a stable, functioning environment for the residents and businesses of the Enoch Mgijima Municipality.”

BKCOB AND Craem also outlined the lack of proper governance, evidenced by various illegal appointments at senior management level, as one of the red flags that brought the the EMLM’s affairs into disrepute.

Among other highlighted issues was the lack of accountability of failed projects such as the R15m Lesseyton Stadium ‘scandal’, burned municipal buildings which include the town hall, the R96m Fikile Godwana road construction and Eskom debt skyrocketing in excess of R900m.

The two organisations were also not pleased with the absence of proactive and consistent communication with key stakeholders.

Failed service delivery of projects, passing of various council resolutions in defiance of the NCR’s and National Treasury instruction viewed as a complete disregard for the Section 139 (7) terms of reference and the powers it gives NCR team, were also mentioned.

The list continued to municipal disregard for court orders as evidenced in the Fikile Godwana road project to illegal appointment of out-of-town security contractors at a price triple the amount quoted by local service providers.

“Grossly unprofessional behaviour as evidenced by the recent public media spat between municipal officials and the NCR, especially when considering that such officials have no authority to make such statements on behalf of EMLM," was also noted.

External electrical engineering groups to remedy electricity faults, whose services are said to come at a significantly increased cost.

Another point was EMLM operating the electrical network in violation of law and of the Nersa licensing provision, as well as energising transformers that have no protection, which was also in contravention of the law.

“It is imperative for the local council to have a good working relationship with the NCR, as this will demonstrate to the community that there is political will that still exists within the municipality to implement an effective financial recovery plan that enables services to be delivered for the benefit of the community.

“The recent antics of the ruling party within the local council and the incumbent municipal administration has demonstrated everything but this. It is with this in mind that we strongly condemn and protest the behavior of the council on Friday November 11 regarding the appointment of an acting municipal manager.

“Whereas we applaud the final dismissal of the previous MM, we protest the fact that council did not

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It is imperative for the local council to have a good working relationship with the NCR, as this will demonstrate to the community that there is political will that still exists within the municipality to implement an effective financial recovery plan’

accept the candidate recommended by the National Treasury, but instead appointed their own candidate, which is of course illegal.”

The two organisations further warned that if “reckless and irresponsible” decisions continued to demonstrate that the local council was not serious about putting the community of Komani first, the business sector and ratepayers would have no option but to seek intervention from the high court to ring-fence all the electricity revenue to be used to contribute to the settlement of the Eskom debt and be contributed to needed repairs for the electrical infrastructure network.

This would include ring-fencing of the equitable share to be received from the National Treasury, also to be used to settle the Eskom debt.

In this case the court would also be approached for a trust account to be created for the receipt of all rates and taxes due to the municipality, from which costs related to various community services would be paid.

“It must be noted that a letter of concern regarding these issues was sent for the attention of the troika and the political leadership of the municipality.

“To date, no response or acknowledgement of receipt was received. While we will continue to encourage the EMLM to get serious about service delivery and start collaborating with the NCR team, business and ratepayers will continue to seek resolution from the SA legal system until order is restored, “the statement read.