Bay councillors demand answers on how SMMEs were paid

Tempers flared at a Municipal public accounts committee (Mpac) meeting at City Hall as some councillors demanded answers on how payments to SMMEs had been administered.

Minutes before Nelson Mandela Bay mayor Mongameli Bobani was expected to address the small business owners, a screaming match ensued between ACDP councillor Lance Grootboom and ANC councillor Ncediso Captain.

The debate came after Grootboom submitted questions to the committee querying the payments to the SMMEs. 

In the written questions included in the agenda Grootboom asked that a detailed report of the amounts allocated and paid to each SMME be provided of the R21m drain cleaning project in December.

The municipality on December 4 approved a plan to divert R21m from Bay projects towards cleaning drains in the metro. At the time political leadership had termed the move as a “Christmas” gift to more than 900 SMMEs.

Since then, some SMMEs said they were not paid despite doing the work.

Grootboom asked that city manager Peter Neilson provide a portfolio of evidence of the work that had been done. 

Grootboom accused the municipality of not taking the matter seriously.

“We are not taking this seriously. We have seen that people are dying over this because people were not paid. There are issues and someone needs to be held accountable,” Grootboom said.

“As things stand, the mayor is going to address SMMEs and we don’t  know what he is going to say them.”

Grootboom was further angered by acting city manager Peter Neilson who did not respond to questions submitted to the committee about the payments to SMMEs.

The questions were included in the agenda.

“This was submitted three weeks ago, it is a serious matter. I sent the questions to the [acting]city manager. We are not taking this serious," Grootboom said.

Captain was, however, pressed to leave the chamber, urging councillors to wrap up the meeting as the SMMEs were making their way to City Hall.

DA councillor Kabelo Mogatosi said he failed to understand why the questions had not been answered.

“There are discussions and an explanation in the media but they can’t account to us. Money has been paid, processes were followed; this is a simple thing and should be very simple to answer,” Mogatosi said.

"Let’s not pretend we are concerned with what happened on [Monday] because we warned people about this. We told them that they need to follow due process but we filled up [Nangoza Jebe] and made promises and now there is a meltdown in the township. So they must account."

Mogatosi said he was worried that Bobani would implicate council and make further promises.

Neilson apologised for not providing a response and said economic development executive director Anele Qaba would provide a detailed report on what had transpired since the December 4 council meeting.

“As an administration we had agreed that this matter was serious enough when the original accusations around the payments were made.”

“[Qaba] has been instructed to work on a proper report that details how the payments were transacted from the time the council made the decision,” Neilson said.

Neilson said Qaba had said the process was a painful process as it involved 900 SMMEs.

“He is busy with it and has undertaken to compile the report. The request is that he doesn’t disclose the details at present but to confirm that there will be a proper report."