INTENSIFIED political pressure to ‘step down’ is no deterrent for City Mayor Elphas Mbatha, who defiantly says he will not ‘run away’ from office.
In an exclusive interview with the Zululand Observer on Tuesday,Mbatha, who was responding to a call by regional ANC delegates for his removal last week, said he intended to serve the remainder of his term.
‘I will only step down if the ANC Provincial Executive Committee (PEC) asks me to resign after considering the decision of the regional body. I am not here to be comfortable. There will always be conflicts and challenges and I cannot leave owing to pressure,’ Mbatha said.
He confirmed that there had been ‘interference’ with his security and protection guards following the meeting of the Regional Executive Committee (REC) last week.
‘While I was at the meeting in Mtubatuba last Thursday, a senior official at the municipality phoned my security officers and instructed them to return with my vehicle before 4pm.
‘The Municipal Manager then intervened and assured me that according to a Council resolution, I was afforded protection services. It is my view that people are after me because they think that once I am gone, they can do as they please.’
Responding to claims that he had been conspicuously absent from ANC meetings of late, Mbatha said he was not re-elected as treasurer of the REC in October last year and was therefore not part of the committee.
Target
The mayor however did concede that he had been a target following his outspokenness on tender manipulation and delays.
‘I have been victimised because I put my foot down. The municipality had a target to deliver 5 000 VIP toilets in the 2013/14 financial year and to date has achieved zero. ‘The Auditor General has stated that we have not achieved our objectives in terms of service delivery and that the municipality has underspent in the region of R213-million.
‘Officials have failed to adhere to the ruling of the Provincial Tribunal relating to disputed tenders, which have resulted in out of court settlements costing this municipality millions of rands,’ Mbatha said.
‘When a provincial crack team intervened in 2013, it was found that underspending was not as a result of capacity, but was deliberate,’ he said.
Mbatha appealed for sanity, adding that the current situation was detracting all from doing their work.
‘Stop employing strategies that are destructive. There is no substitute for service delivery. The only way to make the City better is through better services.’
@RonelleRamsamy
