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EFF sets sights on Ekurhuleni mayorship in deal with ANC to boot DA, say insiders

EFF sets sights on Ekurhuleni mayorship in deal with ANC to boot DA, say insiders
Queenin Masuabi
By Queenin Masuabi
13 Oct 2022
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The ANC has officially announced its intention to boot out Ekurhuleni metro mayor Tania Campbell and put an end to the minority government in the municipality.

The ANC has been working tirelessly to remove the DA from power in metros across Gauteng by forming an alliance with the EFF. It has successfully ousted City of Joburg Speaker Vasco da Gama and former mayor Mpho Phalatse – now Ekurhuleni mayor Tania Campbell is next on its hit list. 

While the ANC has filed a motion of no confidence in Campbell, it has already started courting the EFF, along with other smaller parties, to ensure it gets an outright majority. 

Read in Daily Maverick: “ANC in talks with ‘a certain political party’ about taking over governance of Ekurhuleni”

ANC insiders confirmed to Daily Maverick that the EFF is willing to work with the ANC on condition it is given the mayorship. At this point the suggested mayoral candidate of the red berets is newly elected provincial chair Nkululeko Ndunga. The ANC would then get the Speaker post and seven mayoral committee positions, while the other three would be occupied by the EFF. 

The negotiations include giving smaller parties such as the African Independent Congress (AIC), The Patriotic Alliance (PA), the Independent Ratepayers Association of South Africa (Irasa) and PAC the responsibility of heading the municipal committees. 

The Ekurhuleni coalition, consisting of the DA, ActionSA, Cope, the Freedom Front Plus, the ACDP and the IFP, has only 94 seats.

A marriage between the ANC and EFF would see a strong partnership, with a total of 117 seats and, with the help of smaller parties, they can secure up to 127 councillors. This will be enough to not only remove Campbell but to appoint their preferred candidate.


Motion of no confidence


The motion of no confidence against Campbell was proposed by ANC councillors Khehla Madlala and Dora Mlambo, who have written to council Speaker Raymond Dhlamini. 

The reasons given for the motion are a mixture of governance and service delivery issues. In particular, they believe Campbell has not served townships adequately.

“That the executive mayor is failing to ensure equitable and sustainable service delivery in light of the clear neglect of townships. This is evident through the service delivery spot checks conducted by councillors, submitted to the executive; and the quarterly service delivery coordination reports tabled by the executive mayor herself. This points to basic failures in the inconsistent collection of waste, power failures outside Eskom load shedding, the lack of basic repairs and maintenance of public facilities, impacting predominantly townships,” according to the ANC councillors. 



They also slam Campell for the recent cabinet reshuffle which they believe was done abruptly. 

“That the executive mayor has caused governance confusion with her abrupt and uninformed decision to realign portfolios, without proper consultation and impact assessment to other governance structures in the municipality. That there has been unprecedented and uncoordinated reshuffling in the mayoral committee, including the failure to appoint an MMC of infrastructure, plunging the department into leadership vacuum for a period of over three months,” their letter reads.



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In a statement issued by the metro last week, Campbell announced that she had made changes to her mayoral committee, in which the DA’s Mabekenyane Thamahane had taken over the human settlements department while ActionSA’s Charlotte Zitha was appointed as MMC for health and social development.

This meant PA councillors Bakang Lethoko and Human Dino Peterson had been removed from the mayoral committee. 

Read in Daily Maverick: “Prepare for a political roller coaster ride as parties jostle for positions in municipal coalitions”

The reshuffle comes after a fallout between the DA and PA in the City of Joburg, which resulted in the multiparty coalition splitting. The coalition, which collapsed after Phalatse was removed as mayor, consisted of the DA, ActionSA, the IFP, FF+, the PA, the ACDP, Cope, the UDM and the ATM. Phalatse was ousted by 139 councillors including those from the PA, and Dada Morero was installed as mayor.

Since her removal, Phalatse has launched a court bid to set aside Speaker Makhubele’s decision to hold an extraordinary council meeting, and the programming meeting’s decision to place the motion against her on the agenda. She is urging the courts to declare the adoption of the motion and Morero’s appointment as mayor invalid.

This comes after her bid to have the sitting interdicted was struck off the roll by the Johannesburg High Court on Friday. The court reasoned that Phalatse had already been ousted before the matter could be heard virtually.

Campbell and the multiparty minority were due to release a statement in response to the planned motion after their meeting later on Thursday. DM

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