Durban - The acting eThekwini municipal manager, Musa Mbhele, has emerged as one of the front runners for the new city boss post, sources in the municipality have revealed.
The process to appoint the city manager is approaching finality, with the names of three seasoned officials having been put forward to the council by the interview panel.
The Mercury has been reliably informed that current acting city manager Mbhele, former municipal boss Sbu Sithole and Musa Gumede could be presented to the council as possible candidates for the position by the end of the month.
The interviews were held on Thursday and Friday last week. There were more than 140 candidates for the position, and about 17 of these were short-listed and interviewed. Three names will be forwarded to the executive committee, and then to the full council.
The city manager position has been vacant for more than a year after the departure of Sipho Nzuza. Nzuza was implicated in acts of corruption, and is set to stand trial alongside former mayor Zandile Gumede, and several other city officials and councillors.
The chairperson of the panel, deputy mayor Philani Mavundla, said the process should be allowed to reach finality without interference.
“We cannot talk about this process as it is confidential. The information The Mercury has with regard to this matter is incorrect.” He said the matter was sensitive and should be treated as such.
“This process was spoken about before, and that caused a lot of controversy. We do not want that to happen this time around. Our official response on the matter is that a report will be tabled to the council in August.”
Another panel member, the DA’s Thabani Mthethwa, also declined to comment.
These interviews are the second attempt by the city to fill the vacancy. Earlier this year, the city had conducted an interview process and the interview panel had recommended that Max Mbili be appointed. Mbili is currently the municipal manager for the Ray Nkonyeni Municipality.
However, opposition parties in the executive committee rejected this recommendation after allegations emerged that the ANC in the province had interfered with the process and pushed for Mbili to be appointed.
The majority in the executive committee recommended to the council that it reject Mbili’s appointment, and the majority in the full council also rejected the appointment.
After that, opposition parties said they had been unhappy with how the recruitment and interview process had been handled. A new interview panel was set up, and included members of the opposition – Thabane Miya of the EFF and Mthethwa of the DA.
Mbili launched a legal challenge regarding the council rejecting his candidature, and the matter was scheduled to come before the Durban High Court this month.
The council, however, then amended the requirements for the post and inserted a new clause that demanded that any person considered for the position should be accustomed to running a big organisation that had billions of rand in its budget and thousands of employees.
This change essentially disqualified Mbili as his current employer fell below the threshold. The Mercury understands that he did not apply for the position the second time around.