CoGTA finalising framework for councillor's conduct, motions of no confidence

Nkadimeng delivered the State of Local Government Report to the media in Pretoria on Wednesday.

The report highlighted the problems, ongoing support, work, and interventions geared towards turning around municipalities and ensuring an effective and efficient functioning local government.

It also showed that the number of dysfunctional municipalities has increased from 64 in 2021 to 66 in 2022.

Nkadimeng's briefing comes as various municipalities have had leadership challenges since the 2021 local government elections, where political parties had to form coalitions to govern.

However, this has led to instability in various municipalities due to continuous disruptions and motions of no confidence.

Nkadimeng says the decision to put together a code of conduct for councillors was due to disruptions in Tshwane and eThekwini, where councillors physically attacked one another instead of sitting and debating on governance matters.

"So the code of conduct looks closely into what should be the measures that the speaker can apply jointly with council if disruptions are the order of the day. We need to link with the thought of not trying to micromanage but with the thought of instability. 

“Because if the meeting is disrupted, it means the council can’t conclude when the operations are supposed to be done, and it gets to be postponed again and again.(But) it was not only coalitions that are unstable.”

She added: "We also want to regulate on the number of motions of no confidence... There are two critical areas on how they should come about, which are fraud, corruption, and not providing service delivery. 

“So it should be based on performance or non-performance, or perhaps the mayor not showing up.  

“But it can’t be based on slight provocation, like not greeting, and now you’re angry with Party B, and you are walking away and forming another coalition with somebody else. It doesn't last." 

Nkadimeng named Nelson Mandela Bay is another example of instability.

"You may think we are micromanaging them. Just look around; from 2016 to 2021, Nelson Mandela Bay didn’t build a single RDP house. Not that they didn’t have the money. They turned no less than R500 million back.

“It's fair and well for the parties to win elections and govern how they want. 

“But we need to protect citizens who were supposed to receive a house in Nelson Mandela Bay when funds were provided and were not utilised, and no one was held accountable.”

“Amongst other things, the report confirmed the correlation between failures in governance and political oversight as the primary causes underpinning the increase in the number of dysfunctional municipalities. 

"These failures are also attributed to the lack of adequate support from national and provincial government departments and other service delivery departments.

“The huge year-on-year percentage increase in average outstanding debt per municipality owed to Eskom.

“DWS and Water Boards and other suppliers of goods and services is a clear indication that the majority of municipalities are not honouring payment arrangements with the suppliers of bulk services and that virtually no progress has been made to reduce the debt owed to the suppliers of bulk services," she said.

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