Triumphant ANC Greater Tshwane Caucus Spokesperson Councillor Joel Masilela says they knew all along that the DA’s motion of no confidence in Council Speaker Mncedi Ndzwanana would not succeed.
This as the DA simply doesn’t have numbers in the City of Tshwane Council to carry out such an ambitious feat.
Masilela said this after the majority of Councillors in the chambers voted against the removal of Ndzwanana from his position as the Council Speaker on Thursday.
“By bringing about this motion of no confidence in the Council Speaker the DA and its partners FF Plus were just trying to make themselves relevant in the politics of the country as well as those of the City of Tshwane,” said Masilela.
“Now that the ANC and its coalition partners have done well in bringing about stability in the finances of the City by paying out handsome salaries to officials who are at the coalface of service delivery, the DA was today trying to dismantle an effective administration but failed, so we will continue to bring the much-needed services to the people of Tshwane and we have a revitalisation strategy to grow the economy of the City of Tshwane by 3,9% by 2029,” he said .
“Watch this space, the current coalition government in the City of Tshwane under the leadership of the ANC and its partners is equal to the task of making sure that all other obligations of the City like paying off the Eskom debt, Rand Water and service providers will be met and the City’s liquidity position is currently on an upward stream,” he said.
Masilela said the incumbent Speaker Mncedi Ndzwanana has demonstrated utmost discipline and has up to this far done nothing outside the perimeters of the law, and the ANC therefore doesn’t have any reasons to remove him from office.”
In response to the outcome of the vote of no confidence motion, DA Councillor Ofentse Madzibatela said the following:
“The Democratic Alliance and the ANC are the only parties which possess wards in the City of Tshwane therefore as the DA we must be accorded our right to express our opinion and represent those constituencies in a fair manner, that is why we called for the removal of the Council Speaker because he was denying the DA of the aforementioned right.”
Madzibatela pointed out that some members of the current coalition government are not happy about Speaker Ndzwanana and that they only opposed the motion of no confidence brought by the DA out of political expediency.
“We are very happy that our plan to retain Ndzwanana as Council Speaker has succeed because we want to maintain stability in the City of Tshwane and what is important is that Ndzwanana has managed to establish the much-awaited Wars Committees which couldn’t be established for many years in Tshwane,” said Tshwane EFF leader Obakeng Ramabodu.
“What transpired today in the Council chambers is a misguided and failed attempt by the desperate alliance which is the DA because they can’t swallow the proverbial bitter pill (being removed from the City of Tshwane administration) and they therefore attempted to push this motion of no confidence in the Council Speaker Mncedi Ndzwanana so as to destabilise a working coalition government in the City of Tshwane, but we defeated them and now bruised former Mayor Cilliers Brink must now go and tell his handler in Cape Town Helen Zille that the DA has been defeated in the City of Tshwane Municipality Council” said ActionSA Caucus Spokesperson in the City of Tshwane Tshepiso Modiba, stressing that the people of Tshwane have actually won the day as a result of Council Speaker Ndzwanana surviving the motion of confidence.
Just before voting could take place regarding the motion of no confidence, incumbent Council Speaker Ndzwanana was asked to step down from his position and the process was conducted under the chairmanship of Councillor Patel as a stop-gap acting speaker.