The Middelburg High Court has struck the Democratic Alliance’s application to remove the Govan Mbeki Municipality speaker, Fikile Magagamela, from her office, off the roll with costs on Tuesday, June 21.
The high court ruled that the DA application was not urgent and raised technicalities in their applications.
“The high court said our matter is not a matter of urgency and it was struck off the roll, but we will appeal the judgement,” said DA councillor, James Masango.
“We are going to take the matter back to court. We want the court to decide whether the council speaker is legitimate or illegitimate after the voting process in the motion of no confidence against her that took place in the council meeting held in March,” said Masango.
The motion was brought forward by the African Transformation Movement’s councillor, Lwandile Zimele, and was supported by all opposition parties. However, he later withdrew it.
After the motion was presented in the meeting, it was rejected by ANC councillors, while all opposition parties wanted the motion to stand as the standing item.
That started a lengthy debate when a DA councillor proposed the speaker leave her chair and must not preside over the motion as it is about her removal, because it is a conflict of interest and against the council’s standing orders.
Magagamela was, however, protected by ANC councillors who claimed the speaker should preside over her motion.
They denied that the matter was contradictory to the standing orders.
The matter was taken to a vote to decide if the motion can remain as a standing item.
The ANC lost to opposition parties by 26 to 33 votes.
The speaker then announced that the motion must be debated but the opposition parties felt the ANC was trying to run away from reality and told the ANC to debate the motion internally.
Councillors of the opposition parties were surprised because they usually don’t debate matters but rather go over to a vote when they disagree.
The DA said they decided to take the matter to court after exhausting all internal processes within the municipality, and also claimed the refusal by the former acting municipal manager, Lizzy Tshabalala, to call a council meeting to elect a new speaker.
The DA asked the court to treat the matter as urgent and requested the court to declare that Magagamela is longer the GMM council speaker and to order the former acting municipal manager to call a council meeting to elect a new speaker
The DA said that should the MM fail to call a meeting, the court should ask the MEC of CoGTA, in line with the structures act, to appoint somebody to call the council meeting to elect the new speaker and the former acting municipal manager Lizzy Tshabalala pay all costs of court proceedings.
