Coalition Walks out of Tshwane Council over Unlawful Presence of Fired Councillors

17 March 2023

The multi-party coalition in the City of Tshwane has walked out of Council following the refusal of the Speaker to act on the requirement to remove terminated former Councillors from the chambers.

ActionSA terminated the membership of two councillors this morning and COPE has communicated the withdrawal of their councillor in Tshwane. Despite this, the Speaker has refused to act on these vacancies claiming not to have received the official notice.

The multi-party coalition sought to draw to the Speaker’s attention that Section 27 of the Municipal Structures Act requires councillors elected of the PR lists to councils to be members of a political party. The coalition observed that the ongoing presence of these councillors, whose membership has been terminated, was unlawful and likely to have a material impact on the election of the Mayor.

It is suspected that allowing these councillors to vote was an essential component in the plan of the ANC and EFF to have their candidate elected today to the position of Mayor of Tshwane and to coordinate this along with the ANC’s march to the council chamber- an act consistent with the intimidation we have seen in previous Council meetings.

The multi-party coalition provided every opportunity for the Speaker to correct this matter. This included proposing that the meeting be adjourned until next week until such time as a competent legal opinion has been obtained in order to avoid litigation over today’s council meeting. Bizarrely the Speaker accepted the proposal to obtain a legal opinion and adjourned the meeting only to reverse his decision and return at 7pm without a legal opinion. At this point the multi-party coalition resolved to walkout of the council meeting.

The ANC and EFF have led a coup against a coalition government that was awarded a majority by the residents of Tshwane. Through a now exposed programme of vote-buying they have sought to seize control of Tshwane and today sought to finalise this through a meeting with votes from former councillors who are not lawfully allowed to attend council meetings much less vote for Mayors.

The multi-party coalition in Tshwane will fight for the residents of Tshwane to ensure that the election result of 2021 is not stolen, to ensure that this coalition returns to office and that we get Tshwane back on track to the benefit of all of its residents.

Statement issued by Dr Cornè Mulder, DA welcomes Gauteng High Court interdict of EFF national shutdown violence, 18 March 2023