Durban – The scheduled sitting of the Nquthu local council – which had already failed five times to elect its office bearers since the August local government elections – was postponed yet again on Tuesday due to "security concerns".
KZN MEC for Co-operative Governance and Traditional Affairs, Nomusa Dube-Ncube, said, “We are determined to facilitate the election of office bearers but we also consider the personal safety of all stakeholders to be paramount.
“We cannot ignore security advice and our view is that we are better safe than sorry," said Dube-Ncube.”
The municipality was placed under administration in October after the council failed to elect its office bearers on five previous occasions. This was to try to ensure service delivery to communities in the absence of a functional council, said the department.
IFP leader in the KZN legislature, Blessed Gwala, commented, “We are deeply disturbed that the meeting has been postponed for security reasons. This proves that this provincial government is weak, toothless and incapable of providing security to the citizens of KwaZulu-Natal."
Gwala alleged that the postponement indicated political interference in a bid to prevent the IFP from taking over the municipality.