The Inkatha Freedom Party in KwaZulu-Natal is extremely perturbed after unruly members of the ANC disrupted a meeting called in Pietermaritzburg to elect the Nqutu Municipal Council today.
“For over five months the Nqutu Municipality has been without a properly elected council. Due to threats and intimidation of councillors, the Department of Co-operative Governance and Traditional Affairs (COGTA) decided not to hold the meeting in Nqutu but rather to move it to the Pietermaritzburg City Hall and to appoint its own administrator, Mr Zamo Mkhize to oversee the process. The meeting proceeded well until the name of the IFP candidate for the position of Speaker was proposed and seconded. At this point, Mr Lucky Moloi who we believe is the ANC mayoral candidate questioned why Mr Zamo Mkhize was running the election and not COGTA. Then ANC members from Pietermaritzburg barged into the hall singing and chanting ANC slogans. Their actions disrupted the entire process,” said IFP Leader in the KZN Legislature, Mr Blessed Gwala MPL.
“There were very few SAPS members present and when members of the Public Order Policing arrived they provoked members of the IFP who were gathering outside the City Hall after they heard that ANC members were disrupting a government event. I tried calling the MEC for COGTA as well as senior members of the ANC in the province including Mr Super Zuma, the ANC Provincial Secretary, but none of them answered their phones. It would appear that this was another ploy by the ANC to derail the election process. From what happened today it is clear that Mr Lucky Moloi is the ANC’s canon on the deck and that the ANC is hell-bent on ensuring that the people of Nqutu do not get a democratically elected council. This process has been frustrated by ANC shenanigans ever since the local government elections in August 2016. It is shocking that while the ANC talks of upholding and protecting democratic processes, it allows its members to behave in a most undemocratic manner while its leaders remain silent”, concluded Mr Gwala.
Issued by:
Mr Blessed Gwala MPL
IFP Leader in the KZN Legisature
078 290 5842