ANC caucus fights for access to council chamber in Ekurhuleni
THE ANC caucus in Ekurhuleni is crying foul following a decision to prevent its councillors from accessing the council.
The whip of ANC Ekurhuleni caucus, Jongizizwe Dlabathi, said in making their submission to the minutes of the March council meeting, they called for an investigation into who issued an instruction for ANC councillors to be blocked from returning to the chamber after being in solidarity with the ANC caucus party.
“Once again, Thursday’s council meeting experienced yet another incompetent and biased conduct by speaker
Raymond Dlamini, and this was exposed through a division procedure.
“Furthermore, there is a general sentiment that conduct of the speaker does pose a serious risk to the decorum and the dignity of the council, a matter that must be given serious attention,” Dlabathi said.
Earlier last month former Ekurhuleni mayor Mzwandile Masina was ejected from the council chambers by the council who instructed the EMPD (Ekurhuleni Metro Police Department) unit to remove him.
Dlamini expressed shock and denied allegations that ANC caucus members were blocked from entering the council in an April meeting.
He said the blocking happened in March, but in April the ANC caucus were at the chambers and participated in council processes.
“When we removed Masina and Dlabathi, other ANC councillors walked out of the council chambers, we don’t know what happened outside. It is confusing that the ANC in their media statement said they were denied access. We asked the JMPD (Johannesburg Metro Police Department) unit to remove the two but the entire caucus walked out and I never said they should walk out,” said Dlamini.
He said he was still waiting for the ANC to write to him to say they were denied access to come back to the chamber – if such a complaint was received, an investigation would be done.
Dlamini said after the councillors left, they continued with the business of the day, meaning that not being present in the council does not affect service delivery for the people
“I am shocked for them to say this but I’m not surprised, they are politicians, they want to be entertained and they want people to be on their side,” Dlamini said. “The issue of the ANC in April, they did participate, the dispute is the month of March, they said they were denied access.”
Dlabathi said the ANC caucus commended council for the consideration for debt write-off.
“We commended council for resolving that the city must consider a provision for debt write-offs for all qualifying bad debts that owe the city more than 90 days and that may be impractical and uneconomical to recover.
“This was a sound resolution and we do give credit to council following our concerted campaign working with communities. The marches that were peacefully held across the city did not go in vain.
“We will equally share our progressive input on the framework that must give effect to the implementation of the debt relief incentive, which was correctly withdrawn during the last council. It was a blunder,” Dlabathi said.