EDITOR – The ANC leadership of eThekwini Municipality, as well as the City Manager, Mr Sbu Sithole, demonstrated again at the council meeting on Tuesday 24 February that neither of them can be trusted to abide by undertakings which they make, or are bound by. This is particularly so when it comes to matter of transparency and good governance.
At the Council meeting on 28 January, a resolution was passed by council authorising the City Manager to do many things in regard to the running of the Durban Transport bus service, specifically regarding the appointment of an intervention team to take over the running of the service from Tansnat Durban CC. The closing words of the resolution read as follows: “… and report back to council on a monthly basis.”
The DA expected that the City Manager would duly report back to the council at the meeting on Tuesday on progress made in stabilising the beleaguered bus service since the January 2016 council meeting. At an early stage in the council meeting, I sought clarity as to when the report was to be presented to council, but it was clear that the City Manager had no intention of reporting to council, which he was obliged to do in terms of the January 2016 resolution. It was also disconcerting to note that not one member of the ANC leadership in council had any intention of holding the City Manager to account either.
This failure of the City Manager to comply with the council resolution comes on the back of the City Manager’s refusal to make available to me a copy of the Settlement Agreement which the City Manager had signed on behalf of the Municipality on 29 January. It is common cause between the Municipality and Tansnat Durban CC that the settlement agreement is to be made an order of court, so it seems strange for the City Manager to refuse to disclose the content of the Settlement Agreement. I intend to lodge an application in terms of the Promotion of Access to Information Act to request a copy of the agreement.
Surprisingly, one of the items on the council agenda was a proposal to increase the fare charges by Durban Transport by 9 per cent. What was surprising about the resolution was that, during 2015, the Municipality refused to approve an increase in the tariffs, which it was obliged to do in terms of its agreement with Tansnat Durban CC, despite the urging of Tansnat Durban CC to do so. Now, after only weeks of being in charge of the bus service, the Municipality raises the tariffs!
A matter of extreme concern to the DA, though, is the amendment to the original resolution which the Deputy Mayor, Ms Nomvuso Tshabalala, proposed, namely that the establishment of the proposed municipal entity to run the Durban Transport bus service, should be “fast tracked”. The resolution before the council was very limited in its scope, and only dealt with the tariff increase. What is surprising about that amendment is that since about October 2014, the Municipality’s administration has been, or at least should have been, working on setting up the municipal entity. It seems that the process has been neglected and it has now become a crisis.
Warren Burne
DA PR Councillor
