‘Slap in the face for residents’ — NMB council rejects motions calling for streetlight tender accountability

Two motions tabled by DA councillor Ondela Kepe calling for accountability over the troubled state of Nelson Mandela Bay Metro’s streetlights were dismissed by the council on Thursday – a move Kepe condemned as “a slap in the face of every resident”.

One motion sought the precautionary suspension of more than 10 Electricity and Energy Directorate officials implicated by the Special Investigating Unit (SIU) in alleged fraud and corruption tied to streetlight contracts.

Despite revelations that the SIU had uncovered contraventions of anti-corruption and organised crime legislation, councillors from the ANC and their coalition partners did not support the motions, citing concerns about due process and that the motion was premature.

Read more: Nelson Mandela Bay council to hear motion for immediate suspension of officials implicated in unlawful streetlight contracts

The first motion comes as Minister of Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs Velenkosini Hlabisa revealed that an SIU investigation into controversial streetlight contracts from 2020 had uncovered cases of fraud, contravention of the Prevention and Combating of Corrupt Activities Act and contravention of the Prevention of Organised Crime Act.

Kepe’s motion asked that acting city manager Lonwabo Ngoqo take adequate steps to:

• Immediately suspend every municipal official implicated in fraud, corruption or maladministration related to the streetlight contracts, pending the finalisation of investigations.
• Ensure that all such officials are subjected to formal disciplinary processes in line with applicable legislation and municipal policies.
• Where evidence of criminal conduct exists, ensure that criminal charges are laid without exception against all implicated officials, contractors and intermediaries, and that these matters are referred to the South African Police Service (SAPS), the National Prosecuting Authority (NPA), and all relevant law-enforcement agencies for prosecution.
• Take urgent legal and financial steps to recover all irregular, unauthorised, wasteful and fruitless expenditure arising from the streetlight contracts.
• Pursue civil claims against implicated contractors and individuals to ensure that every rand lost through corruption or maladministration is recovered and returned to the city.

Significant public and parliamentary attention

Supporting the motion, Good party councillor Lawrence Troon said the issue had drawn significant public and parliamentary attention, noting that he had raised concerns about streetlight procurement long before the matter reached Parliament.

Troon, however, said his support was conditional.

“There are councillors involved – six or seven of them,” Troon alleged. “I will support this motion on condition that the same action proposed for officials also applies to councillors. Everyone involved must be named, whether an official or a councillor. We want to see how councillors deal with their own.”

Troon said that officials should not be singled out, saying they did not act alone and that accountability should extend across political lines.

UDM councillor Luxolo Namette partially supported the motion, but rejected some of its recommendations.

He questioned how suspensions could be justified without a formal report being presented to the council.

“There is nothing wrong with the motion itself,” Namette said. “But how do you suspend someone without a report? You must follow a process – you investigate first, then you charge, and only then do you suspend.”

Namette said he supported only two of Kepe’s recommendations, stressing the need for procedural fairness.

Council Speaker Eugene Johnson ruled against the motion, stating that the matter was sub judice and therefore premature, and could not be deliberated by the council at this stage.

Ngqoqo told the council that he had not received the SIU report referred to in the motion. “I can assure council that I have not received this report.”

Rejection ‘came as no surprise’

Reacting to the decision to reject the motion, Kepe said: “Besides the SIU and Hawks investigations, the city manager is well within his rights to institute an internal process to ensure accountability and safeguard evidence from possibly implicated officials. It is extremely careless to allow a situation where officials, with this cloud over their heads, to continue working and possibly tamper with evidence.”

He said opposition parties’ rejection of the motion came as no surprise, as “they do not even respect their own internal policy”.

Kepe said that the decision to reject the motion was “a slap in the face of every resident whose home has been broken into and every resident who has been attacked while walking home from work”.

“They have all the energy to take illegal decisions that end up costing the city millions of rands, including illegally hiring a city manager, and yet when it comes to holding those who steal from residents to account, they are nowhere to be found.”

Read more: NMB mayor promised working streetlights from October, but officials silent on progress

In the second motion, which was also dismissed, Kepe sought to have the Electricity and Energy Directorate account for the fact that they were not prepared for streetlight contracts that had been in place since October last year.

Second streetlight motion

Kepe asked the acting city manager to:

• Table a comprehensive initial report to the council within 30 days, detailing: the total number of faulty streetlights per ward and depot; the nature of the faults and materials required; current stock levels of streetlight materials; budget allocations per depot and the contractor for the remainder of the financial year; and reasons for delays in contractor commencement, particularly in South Depot 1 and 2.
• Immediately ensure the implementation of measures to secure and prioritise the procurement of critical streetlight materials; adjust or reallocate budgets where legally permissible; ensure all contractors could operate concurrently and establish and maintain an accurate, centralised register of faulty streetlights.
• Provide monthly progress reports to the council outlining: repairs completed per ward; contractor performance; expenditure incurred versus work delivered; remaining backlog; and revised timelines.
• ⁠Ensure that future public commitments regarding streetlight repairs are made only where confirmed budgets, materials, and implementation plans are in place.

Kepe said it was “the same committee we have been asking some of these questions in for over 12 months, with no adequate reports being presented. We would not have brought the motion to council if we were getting answers in the committee, and so the attempt was to ensure that we instruct the highest office in the city to ensure that we get the answers we need.”

According to Kepe, the answers are important because for too long “we’ve seen contractors being paid for minimal to no work, and in some instances, as with this one, because of the municipality’s incompetence”.

‘An abuse of councillors’

EFF councillor Ziyanda Mnqokoyi, the party’s political head for electricity and energy, criticised the motion, describing it as an attempt to “abuse” other councillors.

Mnqokoyi said Kepe was a member of the electricity and energy committee, where the issues raised in the motion were already being discussed. She argued that bringing the matter before the council was unnecessary and appeared intended to undermine councillors who did not sit on the committee.

“All that is required in this motion is already being dealt with at committee level,” Mnqokoyi said. “Bringing it to council creates the impression that councillors outside the committee are being targeted or embarrassed.”

Responding to concerns raised during the debate, Mnqokoyi acknowledged that there had been delays on the contractor’s side, largely due to issues with the South African Revenue Service (SARS). However, she said these challenges had since been resolved.

According to Mnqokoyi, the contractor has now resumed work and repairs were under way. DM