The planned election of a deputy mayor was scuppered after ANC councillors, along with their unofficial coalition partner, the EFF, and city manager Musa Mbhele failed to arrive at the venue inside the Durban International Convention Centre on Thursday morning. 

These members started trickling in for lunch after the meeting collapsed for lack of quorum. 

The cost of hosting the special forum has been pegged at R500,000 by opposition councillors who discussed the no-show at the venue. The amount included hiring the venue, additional deployment of the Durban Metro Police, private security, partial road closures, meals for 222 councillors, visiting Amakhosi, the media, guests, those in the public gallery and City officials. Other costs included audio-visual services and live streaming the event.

The city speaker, ANC member Thabani Nyawose, was present, and sat alone on the stage. 

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He claimed that he had no idea why his own party was not present. When cornered by angry opposition party members, who at some point called him “a coward”, he failed to give any assurance that he would act against the errant councillors. 

“Why the ANC is not here I don’t know. What I have been told, they are at the exhibition centre (based across the road from the ICC) having caucus. When I phoned the EFF whip, they told us the same thing,” said Nyawose.  

“I called some councillors but they did not respond or take my call. I have no other explanation except what I have been told by whips.”

During the fracas that ensued, opposition councillors accused the ANC of “sabotaging” the meeting.

‘Insult’ 

IFP councillor Mdu Nkosi told those present that the wasteful expenditure was a direct insult to city residents. 

“You call us to a meeting but your own party is not in a meeting and neither is the city manager. You and the ANC have plotted to make sure this meeting does not continue. It cost R,500.000 to host this meeting. What are you going to say to the city residents?” 

Another councillor said the fact that mayor Mxolisi Kaunda was not present showed his lack of respect for the city. “If the mayor cannot respect us and be here, I see no future to be here,” the councillor was heard saying. 

On Wednesday morning, the municipality released a media advisory that the special election would take place on Thursday. The election has been in the pipeline since December 2022 when the ANC, which leads a minority city government, removed deputy mayor Philani Mavundla, leader of the Abantu Batho Congress (ABC), and various smaller parties who provided the ANC with the 16 seats it required for a majority. 

Read in Daily Maverick: “Beware: Two Zuma men are now in charge of eThekwini”

Mavundla was also removed as chairperson of the powerful human settlements and infrastructure committee.

It has been alleged that the ANC wanted a more pliable deputy mayor and committee chairperson and would elect such a person with the help of the EFF and some smaller parties. 

DA leader in the city, Thabani Mthethwa, tried unsuccessfully to get Nyawose to commit to “what he would do” about the errant councillors. 

“It is clear that the undertaking we need from you is that you’re going to conduct necessary investigation against those councillors. Your office has incurred fruitless and wasteful expenditure. We want you to commit to taking action against these councillors,” said Mthethwa. 

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The City’s communications department, which is often quick to attack opposition parties by name in its official media communications, released a short statement just after the sitting collapsed, but made no mention of the ANC or the EFF.  

“The eThekwini Municipality Full Council meeting was adjourned this morning as it could not meet quorum as a result of two main parties not being present. In terms of the council rules, the meeting will be reconvened in the next seven days.”

‘Dereliction of duty’

The DA, which is also the official opposition in the council, issued a statement immediately after the meeting, calling the non-attendance by the ANC, EFF and Mbhele a “complete dereliction of duty which cannot be left without consequences”, and adding that it appeared that Mbhele, who is expected to be apolitical, was “being allowed to be drawn into ANC faction politics through his non-attendance”.

“The DA finds this move by both parties and the City Manager disgraceful. The City Manager must face disciplinary action by the eThekwini Council for his gross misconduct today. As a result, we will request Speaker Thabani Nyawose to investigate the ANC and EFF’s conduct in terms of Item 15 of the Councillors Code of Conduct, as well as being referred to the Ethics Committee. The DA will ensure that Councillors and the City Manager will be held accountable, even if it is out of their own pockets.”

According to a News24 report, Kaunda refused on Thursday to say why his ANC colleagues had failed to attend the special council meeting.

The non-attendance cannot only be viewed within the context of the looming vote for a deputy mayor.

In recent weeks, mayor Kaunda’s position has become increasingly vulnerable. He has become the face of the city’s poor response to its sewage crisis, which resulted in many of eThekwini’s beaches closing over the festive season owing to high E. coli levels flowing into the ocean along the majority of the city’s major river systems. 

Read in Daily Maverick: “eThekwini mayor Mxolisi Kaunda nearly tops the pile for sewage in our sea water”

The city is also often viewed as ground zero for the ANC’s factional battles. 

On Wednesday, the speaker was asked in a letter to allow for a vote of no confidence in Kaunda to be heard at the next full council meeting, scheduled for 31 January. 

The request was submitted by councillor Imtiaz Syed, president of the Active Citizens Coalition, and an ally of Mavundla. The speaker is yet to announce whether the motion will be heard. 

Among the reasons for the vote of no confidence are claims that Kaunda has overseen the loss of “approximately 60% in revenue from water purchased from the Umgeni Water Board”, the constant water and power outages in the city’s northern regions, the uncoordinated relocation of flood victims, and an increase in vagrancy and homelessness across the city.  

Earlier on Thursday, Mavundla told SAfm talk show host Stephen Grootes that he would vote for Kaunda’s removal and would support a candidate from the DA if the vote went ahead. 

“In the last 12 months that I was deputy mayor as well as the chairperson of the human settlements and infrastructure committee, I learned that eThekwini doesn’t have any infrastructure left. For instance, eThekwini owns 27 wastewater treatment works, of which 24 don’t have operating licences, and 17 of them have been run to total failure,“ said Mavundla. 

He said this was reported to Kaunda, the city leadership and the ANC leadership as early as November 2021, nearly six months before the devastating April 2022 floods. Mavundla said no one listened.

“The best thing to do is to remove the leadership and put somebody else in [office] that may take our environment and our people more seriously,” said Mavundla. 

He said the “one biggest mistake” of his political career had been supporting the ANC in a coalition government in eThekwini. DM