The front line service delivery failures of our municipalities often only rise to the top of our collective media attention when a tragic event like the death of a resident takes place, stemming from the failure of service delivery. Like Andries Tatane being brutally murdered in a protest, or five-year-old Michael Komape dying in a pit toilet in Limpopo, or eight-year-old Musa Mbele drowning in a river in QwaQwa while fetching water.

We routinely give our non-metro municipalities attention when the Auditor-General issues yet another scathing report on the state of municipalities, but even then we seldom zoom in on the individual municipalities despite a wealth of claims and assessable evidence.

Every week on a show I host on SAfm, we do an incredibly popular feature called The Municipal Watch, where we get down to the details of municipal failure and/or corruption. Our latest instalment has perhaps been the most naked example of corruption and service delivery failure.

It is the story of Ngaka Modiri Molema District Municipality mayor Khumalo Molefe. This is the municipality under which small towns such as Klerksdorp, Lichtenburg and Mafikeng fall. 

Mayor Molefe is accused by business owners in the area of directly and brazenly asking them for money in exchange for cooperation and allocation of tenders within the municipality.

These accusations weren’t just made in the media: the business owners have furnished sworn affidavits to this effect, accompanied by a slew of other evidence.

The mayor, who earns a fairly modest public service salary, is alleged to have bought his wife expensive vehicles and to be building his very own Nkandla-like home, funded by businesses owners who acquiesced to the mayor’s alleged demands.

This isn’t the point I am driving at. I am more interested in the sheer lack of concern from the provincial and national authorities.

A question that must arise from all of this is, at what point does the leadership of the province – both as the state and the governing party – see the allegations as a matter worthy of their time and attention?

Who must say what – or what must first happen – before someone is irritated enough by the repeated allegations to want to do something about it?

In a province and indeed a country that is still processing the revelations made at the Zondo Commission – and in some instances criminal prosecutions arising from there – surely the North West MEC for Human Settlements, Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs, Nono Maloyi, who is also ANC provincial chairperson, cannot afford to continue pretending that nothing has been said or alleged?

It must be made clear here that nobody is making an assumption of guilt or innocence. That is the prerogative of the criminal justice system. Only a competent judicial body can decide who is guilty and who is not, and what sanctions, if any, must be taken.

The duty of those in charge of the state is to be at all times careful stewards of the resources that the people of the republic, the province and the local municipalities have entrusted them with. Part of this responsibility is to, at the very least, apply their minds to the complaints and allegations made against those in charge of the best interests of the state.

It may perhaps be understandable if the MEC dismissed the allegations as yet another political attempt by faceless individuals to play dirty against an opponent. This, unfortunately, is not the case here.

It would also benefit Mayor Molefe to have the matter publicly ventilated and a decision made, one way or another.

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The electorate of the Ngaka Modiri Molema District Municipality – as well as the business community doing work for and with government – deserve to get a sense that the matter is seen as, at the very least, embarrassing and therefore requiring a speedy but fair and transparent investigation and resolution.

Whether they are driven by malice or political gamesmanship, we will never know. In the long run, their feelings about the mayor may be irrelevant if there is a case against Molefe.

This is why the MEC must play his role. He must be seen to have performed a preliminary investigation. The matter can then be referred to the competent law enforcement authorities.

It is not for the MEC to decide whether or not there is a case against the person facing the accusation.

The Ngaka Modiri Molema District Municipality has the misfortune of overseeing one of the councils that seems to always court negative media and public attention – the Ditsobotla Local Municipality.

With one municipality in the district having a reputation so terribly tarnished, one would expect that provincial leadership would start addressing any whiff of impropriety by those who hold state power.

Ditsobotla may be the best-known example nationally of misgovernance after dairy company Clover decided to uproot itself and move to KZN, but it is definitely not an isolated case.

Public representatives and government officials routinely treat the municipal coffers as their own private piggy bank to be raided at will.

A lack of consequence management emboldens the looters and encourages new thieves to try their luck. Who would not try their hand if they saw that no matter who says what, the powers that be will simply look away and wait for the media storm to blow over?

Another reason the MEC should find this matter worthy of his urgent attention is that he was brought in to stabilise the party; to be the face of the governing party’s renewal.

Renewal of the ANC remains idle talk unless the party demonstrates in ways that are open for everyone to see that it will address even the slightest suggestion that its deployed cadres see the state or their deployment as a chance to enrich themselves.

If Maloyi’s reason for inaction is that he does not want to rock the boat and find himself out of a job when the province holds its next electoral conference, then perhaps he should not even be considering the task of leading the ANC in North West.

The people of North West deserve a leadership that is brave and demonstrates integrity at all times. DM