ANC wants to change rules on paying legal bills

In a desperate attempt to get ratepayers to foot the legal bills of three DA councillors who took on their party, the Nelson Mandela Bay municipality wants to change its policy to allow this.

Council speaker Buyelwa Mafaya will ask the council on Tuesday to devise a new policy that will allow her to make the call on whether or not councillors’ legal bills should be paid by the city.

She also wants the city manager or chief operations officer to make the call when it comes to lawyers’ fees for municipal employees.

The report was meant to be tabled in the council on Thursday, but the meeting adjourned at about 6pm when the governing coalition failed to muster the numbers for a quorum.

The request follows legal advice obtained by Mafaya which states that paying the legal bills of councillors Victor Manyati, Trevor Louw and Neville Higgins would constitute irregular expenditure.

It is unclear how much their fees amount to thus far.

On Monday, The Herald reported that ANC councillor Andile Lungisa had made the suggestion during a confidential mayoral committee meeting in March.

The three councillors turned against their party on different occasions, starting from August.

Manyati was instrumental in unseating the DA at the August 27 council meeting when he voted with the then opposition.

Louw and Higgins, in turn, attended a council meeting that the DA caucus had agreed to stay away from, giving the governing coalition a muchtion

Marlon Daniels

needed quorum. The two of them were fired from the party but continued turning up at council meetings, with the DA going to court to have them declared no longer members.

They recently lost their attempt to have the judgment overturned.

The three councillors did not attend Thursday’s council meeting.

In a report that had been circulated as a flyer, Mafaya wrote that she had sought legal advice on the matter.

Summarising the legal advice she wrote: “Section 109 states that the municipality may provide legal representa

‘We cannot vote in favour of taking taxpayers’ money for internal fighting’

to a councillor who is facing legal proceedings as a result of any act (or) omission in the exercise of his or her powers or the performance of their duties.”

She said further that questions had been raised around whether the “impugned acts of the councillors were done solely for their position as councillors”.

“The councillors publicly stated that they were acting in the performance of their duties as councillors when they acted in defiance to the DA’s instructions because their conscience dictated they do so,” she wrote.

Mafaya recommended further to the council that the consideration for Section 109 requests for councillors be delegated to her because she was the custodian responsible for the welfare of councillors.

It is unclear if this policy would be applied retrospectively or for future legal matters should it get the nod from the council.

Apart from Higgins, Louw and Manyati, other councillors before the courts are ANC councillors Andile Lungisa and Bongo Nombiba, who were convicted of assault and fraud, respectively.

After the council meeting, opposition parties the DA, COPE, ACDP and Patriotic Alliance aired their views on the proposal. On Manyati, Higgins and Louw, ACDP councillor Lance Grootboom said he could not support an item where three councillors went against the electorate who voted the ANC out of power and brought instability to the metro.

“Now they want the ratepayers to pay the legal fees for putting the very same ANC they voted out back into power,” he said.

“I would’ve loved the motion [of no confidence in mayor Mongameli Bobani by the PA] to be tabled and see Bobani out for good, but we didn’t have the numbers.

“We cannot take from the ratepayers and they can’t expect us to take from the residents.

“It is totally unacceptable.”

COPE councillor Siyasanga Sijadu said that as someone who believed corruption was what broke down society, she was not going to be party to a move which would see the ratepayers paying the legal fees of councillors.

PA councillor Marlon Daniels said: “With regards to wanting to loot taxpayers’ money by wanting to pay the legal fees of councillors Manyati, Louw and Higgins, we cannot vote in favour of taking taxpayers’ money to pay for internal fighting and party issues within the DA.”

Daniels said Lungisa and Bobani were the sole reason the metro was on a slippery slope and the motion of no confidence was an attempt to remedy this.

DA councillor Nqaba Bhanga said if the move to pay councillors’ legal bills was approved, the DA would report it to auditor-general Kimi Makwetu.

“This is Lungisa’s way of trying to say to the municipality that if you pay for Higgins, Manyati and Louw, you might as well pay for my criminal action and any case that I’m taking to court.

“If they approve it, we will meet them in court and each and every councillor who approves this,” Bhanga said.