Trollip beats motion

[caption id="attachment_231144" align="aligncenter" width="595"] Patriotic Alliance councillor Marlon Daniels and Zilindile Vena from the EFF discuss the vote of no confidence in the council.
Picture: Eugene Coetzee[/caption]

Nelson Mandela Bay mayor Athol Trollip had the last laugh yesterday when a bid to remove him by two of his fiercest rivals bombed.

Amid a stormy council meeting, the last for the year, Trollip saw a motion for a vote of no confidence in him, brought by PA councillor Marlon Daniels and seconded by UDM councillor Mongameli Bobani, defeated by 65 votes to 54.

In the end, the EFF – essentially kingmakers in council – went with the DA-led coalition and voted against the attempted oustings. The motion to remove Trollip was supported by the ANC, United Front and AIC.

Council speaker Jonathan Lawack survived a similar motion – and then to rub it in, Trollip tasted yet another victory when the same parties sided with him in a vote to have the deputy mayor position made redundant.

It was this position that Bobani held briefly before Trollip sacked him and it was the same vacant post that Daniels had tried desperately to take for himself in a failed coalition agreement with the DA. “Those two people [Daniels and Bobani] at the back just make the most unfounded allegations,” Trollip said.

“I think their credibility has gone out the window. They lost that with me a long time ago, but now the public can also see.”

He said he had been confident that sanity and sense would prevail.

“I did not take this vote of no confidence lightly, but the sponsors of the motion did so on completely spurious reasons and had formed a coalition of the aggrieved.”

Trollip said he respected the EFF for its decision.

“I think they saw through all of this.”

Bobani vowed to table another motion against Trollip for the next council meeting.

Speaking about their decision to side with the DA, EFF council leader Zilindile Vena said the party would never support the ANC while it harboured “crooks ”.

“The day for Athol Trollip to be removed is coming, but today is not the day. “The EFF will never vote for the ANC while it still has crooks who are getting paid by the Guptas and are facing criminal charges.”

Aside from the failed motion of no confidence vote against Trollip, the city council passed numerous items on the agenda yesterday.