Qwaqwa - The South African Municipal Workers Union (Samwu) has threatened the mayor of Maluti-A-Phofung Local Municipality in Qwaqwa, Free State, with legal action over his alleged moves against the MAP water board and its CEO.
The municipal union has told Gilbert Mokotso that he has no such powers and that if he goes ahead, he will be taken to task.
This is contained in a letter dated 22 May 2023 seen by IOL.
The letter was sent to Mokotso by Kramer Weinhann Attorneys on behalf of the union.
The bone of contention was a move by the council to include the item of the board on its agenda for a meeting which was billed for Tuesday.
The union said it learnt that Mokotso and his council intend to deal with the matter, and it reminded him that the courts have already ruled against that move.
“We refer to the above matter and confirm that the High Court already made an order in the following terms:
“1.1 Declaring Mr Lefora to be the duly appointed CEO of Map-Water SOC Ltd; and
“1.2 Interdicting the Mayor from interfering with the duties of the "duly elected Board of Map-Water SOC Ltd”.
NEWS: The South African Municipal Workers Union has threatened the Mayor of Maluti-A-Phofung local municipality in Qwaqwa, Free State, with legal action over his alleged moves against the MAP water board & its CEO. The union told Gilbert Mokotso that he has no such powers. @IOL
— Sihle Mavuso (@ZANewsFlash) May 23, 2023
“To the best of our knowledge, the above-mentioned order remains valid and enforceable as no application to rescind the order has been lodge(d).
“We have received notice of the agenda for the council meeting scheduled for 23 May 2023.
“We take note that, in terms of the agenda, the proposal is to remove the current interim board and the current acting CEO.
“In terms of the provisions of the court order referred to above, it will be unlawful for the Board, which was duly appointed, to be removed and for the current acting CEO to be removed from office.
“Apart from the provision of the court order, which we annex hereto for ease of reference, the Board of Map-Water SOC Ltd must appoint the CEO and not the municipal Council in terms of the applicable provisions of the Municipal Systems Act.
“Should you proceed with the proposal in terms of the agenda, we hold instructions to approach the High Court for urgent relief and to seek a cost order against the individual responsible for the unlawful action in their personal capacity.
“We refer you to the fact that a cost order has already been granted against the mayor in his personal capacity,” reads the letter.
The council sitting was eventually postponed to a future date and Mokotso did not respond when asked by IOL why exactly he does not want the board.
Meanwhile, the ANC in Maluti-A-Phofung in the Free State is warning that the failure of the Maluti-A-Phofung local municipality to provide clean water for residents could lead to a cholera outbreak.
Mandlenkosi Dlamini, the ANC’s caucus whip in the municipality, said the majority of communities in Maluti-A-Phofung municipality continue to struggle accessing clean water.
He attributed the failure to the "incompetence coalition government led by MAP16" which took over the municipality from the ANC in 2021.
"In Maluti-A-Phofung we have areas where the community hasn’t had water coming from taps for over 6 months now, for a number of times residents have been complaining but they don't get attention from the upper spheres of government.
“The municipality has failed with distinction on stabilisation essential services such as the provision of clean water, community members are at high risk as many depend on water from the rivers and Jojo tanks which are not even monitored and checked on a regular basis.
“This has been the order of the day since the coalition government took over.
“The ANC in Maluti-A-Phofung Municipality appeal to the provincial and national government for an urgent response, deploy a multidisciplinary team to assess the situation and start working on a contingency plan to curb the deadly cholera outbreak,” Dlamini said on Tuesday.
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