Nquthu Council finally dissolved before it could ever get going
When a municipality fails to fulfil its legislative mandate or is found to be dysfunctional, the constitution empowers provincial governments to intervene and assume all executive functions of the municipal functions until the municipality improves its affairs
The final dissolution of the Nquthu Council, in a bid to break the deadlock at the Municipality, was completed last week by the National Council of Provinces after there was a meeting held in the Moth hall.
The Nquthu Municipality has failed to constitute the council and executive management structures since the August 3, 2016, elections. Jihad Mohapi, chairperson of the Select Committee on Cooperative Governance and Traditional
Affairs (COGTA), said their visit to this municipality is in response to the October 2016 application of the KwaZulu-Natal Government to put the Council under administration.
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“When a municipality fails to fulfil its legislative mandate or is found to be dysfunctional, the constitution empowers provincial governments to intervene and assume all executive functions of the municipal functions until the municipality improves its affairs,” said Mr Mohapi.
Mr Mohapi added that once the provincial executive council takes such a decision, they are legally required to table their request to the NCOP Chairperson, who then assigns the Select Committee on COGTA for the necessary groundwork before a determination is made on whether to approve the total dissolution of the Nquthu Council.
Reverend James Mthethwa, Chief Whip of this committee, said the NCOP will consider recommendations made by the Provincial government to dissolve the council after discussions with various organisations.
This meeting was attended by councillors, political organisations, youth organisations and women organisations.
Business (farmers and Amakhosi) were not represented.
The NCOP said the unresolved court cases involving the EFF and NFP Councillors in the troubled Nquthu local municipality led the MEC to recommend that Nquthu Municipality must be dissolved.
The IFP was not in favour of this decision claiming that this was deliberately done by the ANC and COGTA ‘because a certain COGTA official was sending out SMS’s asking councillors to leave the meeting while another meeting was disrupted because of ‘security fears’.
The DA and EFF were in favour of the MEC’s decision but they were not given a chance to make their presentations to state their case.
