Mayor Moya is working, not hiding

I was rather amused when, soon after I had inquired with colleagues if Tshwane mayor Nasiphi Moya ever gets to spend time with herself and loved ones, someone responded by sending me Marizka Coetzer’s piece, “Mayor Nasiphi Moya, where art thou?”, published in The Citizen.

Perhaps “amused” is not quite the right word to describe my reaction, but the article certainly piqued my attention.

I reacted in the manner that I have because from where I have been sitting and watching, Moya has been all over the Tshwane metro, from the moment she took over from the DA’s Cilliers Brink.

Any objective observer would admit that Moya has been true to her promise that she would be seen more in worker’s boots on the ground and in overalls than in high heels, when out of the council chambers.

A simple Google search will show that she has incessantly been out to oversee the repair of water infrastructure, the reclaiming of hijacked buildings, the policing of illegal night clubs and spaza shops, the cleaning up of streets, the supervision of businesses that sold expired foods to unsuspecting South Africans, or that produced food in unhygienic premises.

The list is long.

ALSO READ: Drive to repair Tshwane’s ‘five’ potholes

And, oh, she even delivered a funded budget for Tshwane, an arguably unprecedented move in decades.

Her communication and media team has been issuing statement after statement to update the residents and public of the work being done by the multiparty-led Tshwane municipality that she leads.

Moya promised to be a mayor for all of Tshwane residents, irrespective of where they live. Okay, fine, that is what many recently re-elected politicians say in their victory speeches. We can take that away. In fact, no, on second thought, we shouldn’t.

Given the backlog of service delivery in Tshwane’s poor areas, those that had clearly been neglected by previous administrations, it really does make sense that she would spend more time in such areas without neglecting the more serviced middle-class and wealthier areas.

It is a fine balancing act that she, supported by her coalition partners, must perform.

It is known that she has also been meeting representatives of the local business community and other special interest groups to update them on her government’s activities and to forge partnerships with them.

ALSO READ: Tshwane mayor faces outrage for Weskoppies Hospital power cut

Now, before anyone tells me that Moya was the deputy mayor in the administration that preceded the administration she now heads, I am tempted to say that Cyril Ramaphosa was also deputy to his predecessor, the notorious man from Nkandla who is known to have handed over our country to an entrepreneurial Gupta family from India.

Most people seem to have agreed to settle with the explanation that, as deputy president at the height of the institutional wrecking ball state capture, Ramaphosa had no real power and that he had to lie low to wait for his turn to fix things.

I could say the same of Moya, but I won’t, the comparison doesn’t go that far. Moya’s actions speak for themselves.

Coetzer can be assured of one thing; Nasiphi Moya is not in hiding. If she has had to take a few human days off from her very charged mayoral schedule, I believe we should all allow her the courtesy.

She deserves the time off to reconnect with herself and family while she recharges her mayoral batteries.

She is not one to run away or to hide from answering difficult questions, au contraire. She is known to always act like a first responder who charges into problems to solve them, not away from them.

ALSO READ: Tshwane mayor under fire for downplaying pothole crisis

Coetzer must simply be reminded that if anything keeps Moya awake at night, it is not what her predecessor, Brink, or the party he represents, are up to.

Instead, it is how much more her administration can possibly do with the limited resources they have to bridge the material gaps between the poor, historically neglected parts of Tshwane and the wealthier ones who have always received attention.

She wants to bridge this gap, not for some political ideology or to cock a snook at her predecessor and political opponents, but because it makes sense if higher levels of community harmony are to be achieved throughout Tshwane, which she considers, correctly, as an ecosystem whose ailing parts must be healed if the whole is to function in balance.

Who knows, the legend Marizka referred to might be right?

If she calls out Moya’s name three times and she does so in good faith, Moya might reappear before her, not as a tokoloshe, but the humble servant of the residents of Tshwane that she has proven to be since she took over as mayor.