Johannesburg - Chaos ensued at the first council meeting of the year for the Ekurhuleni municipality on Thursday, after hours of delays as parties failed to reach an agreement regarding the prioritisation of the vote of no confidence against the DA’s councillor, Speaker Raymond Dhlamini and council whip Khetha Shandu.
The EFF and the ANC called for the vote of no confidence to be dealt with first, despite the Speaker's request to deal with the motion that was tabled of the adjustment budget and to deal with the items according to how they have been placed on the agenda.
Frustrated DA councillor Dhlamini spoke to Govan Whittles on Newzroom Afrika after adjourning council, saying: “We said let’s start with the adjustment budget then we will continue. We never said council would end after the adjustment budget, but they were proposing a motion not an adjustment and you simply cannot propose two motions at once.
“We need to follow the processes accordingly and things will run smoothly.”
Following hours of back and forth, Dhlamini called for an immediate adjournment of the meeting after the EFF approached the bench to confront the Speaker.
“They were expressing their feelings but they should be doing that in a proper manner, but we will correct that, moving forward in terms of the rules of the house,” said Dhlamini.
The EFFs Gauteng chairperson, Nkululeko Dunga who was also interviewed by Govan Whittles, said: “Of late, the Speaker has shown that he has a lack of understanding of the very systems and procedures that he speaks of, and it’s a systemic approach that the DA has taken, not only from the Speaker’s office, but also from the Chief Whip.
Dunga further explained that their standing of the ruling was based on Rule 89 which speaks to the amendment of the motion in itself that was brought by the DA which is allowed and they have always used that particular rule to amend any motion which is tabled before council.
“We were dealing with all motions in general, there’s about four motions that are tabled before council and we thought that it’s extremely important that we actually deal with them.
“I mean, if there is one political organisation within the council that wants to discuss and debate a motion of no confidence against the Speaker and itself then we are going to delegitimise the process,” said Dunga.
The council meeting, which started at 10am, collapsed at about 4pm and achieved nothing, as no items were tabled. It is not known when the next sitting will take place and who will be nominated for these positions, as the EFF and the ANC attempt to iron things out.
“We are going to try to lobby and enforce that there must be a council meeting that sits before the end of the month, and because we understand that there are a lot of items of compliance and the auditor general to make the submission and follow processes aligned with the Structure and Systems Act, what we will not allow is for the DA to vehemently abuse the power and manipulate the standing orders as they see fit like they have continuously been doing,” said Dunga.
A new date for a new council meeting is expected to be communicated within the next seven days.
IOL