Kenneth Moeng Mokgatlhe
Danger, disaster, and dysfunctional are words that can easily sum up the drama taking place at the troubled Ditsobotla local municipality in the North West. The municipality was dissolved due to its inability to pay workers for more than five months and failure to meet its service delivery mandate in 2022.
Subsequently, Parliament resolved to dissolve the municipality, which was under the rule of the divided ANC, where there was a parallel council consisting of two speakers, two mayors, and two municipal managers.
As if that is enough, the bi-elections brought more drama wherein the Patriotic Alliance’s Elizabeth Lethoko was elected as a mayor with the help of the ANC, which failed to secure an outright majority. Lethoko resigned a few hours after being elected to office. In a twist of events, she went back the following day to reclaim her office, claiming to be “withdrawing” her resignation.
A party known as Forum 4 Service Delivery (F4SD) submitted a motion of no confidence against Lethoko, which was successfully debated last week wherein the new mayor, Thabo Nkashe from F4SD, was elected in a council sitting where the ANC and other minority parties did not attend but formed a quorum.
The municipality does not only worry about the payment of workers. They are also worried about the creditors, as their debt stands at R4.4 billion and could dramatically go higher due to arrears and services rendered not being paid, such as electricity and security. They are expecting a more equitable share from the treasury, which will not make much improvement as it will only be able to pay the salaries of workers who are not going to work due to not receiving their salaries since last month.
One creditor, Onkarabile Mogapi, successfully took the municipality to Lichternburg Magistrate’s Court, where the Sheriff was ordered to put movable properties belonging to the municipality to public auction, where they sold cars and trailers amounting to between R15 to R20 million.
Another creditor won his case, where he took the computers of the municipality containing sensitive and personal information. However, the municipality successfully interdicted the creditor and sheriff from selling the property at an auction. These computers are still with the sheriff, but its been ordered not to sell them yet.
When the former mayor, Lethoko, appeared before the provincial legislature, she made it clear to the lawmakers that the municipality was so broke that they could not afford to buy toilet paper to be used at the headquarters. It is clear that the municipality has completely collapsed, and not much can be done to save it because it is just non-existent.
As a freelance journalist, I interviewed a deployed person in the name of Muthotho Sigidi about his plans to help rescue the municipality as it has been placed under mandatory intervention, the man understands what he is talking about, but I fear that his plans will not be able to be implemented due to the unfavourable political climate.
A few years ago, when the biggest dairy company, Clover, left Lichtenburg due to poor service delivery (no water, electricity, and bad roads), I thought the local, district, and provincial governments would be ashamed and correct their conduct. However, the situation became worse, wherein they did not even try to put a fight together to stop the company from leaving. They could have made promises to the company and fulfilled such promises by restoring clean water, building roads, and fixing electricity issues.
Sigidi is honest enough to say that the municipality needs to be rebuilt from scratch; for that to happen, he needs between 5 to 10 years to be able to make it viable and working. He will spend about three years in a bid to implement the financial recovery plan as part of the mandatory intervention by the provincial government. What is positive is that political parties respect his work, but what is troublesome is that political parties are not united to end the Ditsobotla disaster waiting to happen.
For Ditsobotla to be able to help rebuild its municipality, political parties represented in its council should be bold and be able to outgrow themselves by working together and allowing improvements to be made. It is not time to sabotage those who are in control of the municipality because it would amount to directly hurting the residents who are the chief clients of Ditsobotla local municipality. It is, therefore, of vital importance to ensure that political parties agree to work together for the sake of the people of Ditsobotla.
North West provincial government must take Ditsobotla as an important lesson because other municipalities on the brink of total collapse are on their way. I know of Ramotshere Moiloa local municipality, which owes Eskom a staggering R100 million and don’t have any idea of how they will be able to pay off the debt. They are clueless.
Mokgatlhe is a freelance writer and thought-leader.