Parliament questions Mangaung’s 38 municipal appointments before elections - IOL

Chairperson of the cooperative governance and traditional affairs (Cogta) portfolio committee, Dr Zweli Mkhize says the committee had picked up that a number of municipalities were filling vacancies on the eve of the change of administration.

With South Africa preparing to elect new municipal councils on Wednesday, November 4, Parliament’s local government oversight committee is questioning why some municipalities are rushing to fill senior vacancies before the change of administration.

Committee chairperson Dr Zweli Mkhize says the timing of appointments by outgoing councils raises questions about whether incoming administrations are being left with officials selected by their predecessors.

While there appears to be no law preventing municipalities from filling vacancies close to an election, Mkhize said the process should be transparent and justified.

“In principle, the question is, can you burden an incoming administration with officials who were selected by the outgoing team?” he told the Cape Times.

“It raises suspicion of why, over the past five years, these posts were not filled, and why suddenly you can fill so many. The other question is, if there are vacancies, can they not wait until the election?”

Mkhize said the committee wanted to establish whether municipalities could demonstrate that vacancies were being filled as part of an efficient and properly managed process.

He questioned why posts had remained vacant for years, only for recruitment to accelerate shortly before a new administration takes office.

“We are not advocating that you should leave all vacant posts for the new administration to fill in, but we are saying we need to demonstrate that it was because they were vacant, and it was because, by the time by which they should have been advertised, that you actually went and did that advertisement,” he said.

Mkhize said the committee wanted to avoid any suspicion that appointments were being made for reasons other than the needs of the municipality.

The concerns come amid wider questions about the skills and suitability of municipal officials. Mkhize has also called for skills audits and more professional municipal administrations, arguing that officials should have the qualifications and capabilities required for their positions.

Earlier this month, EFF MP Carl Niehaus asked Co-operative Governance and Traditional Affairs (Cogta) Minister Velenkosini Hlabisa whether he was aware of alleged last-minute mass appointments of senior municipal officials in Mangaung Metropolitan Municipality and whether they complied with the law.

The municipality had advertised 38 positions, several of them managerial posts.

Niehaus told the IOL News that he believed the outgoing administration was trying to “rule from the grave”, leaving whoever took power after the election with appointments that could not easily be changed.

He argued that senior appointments close to an election should be left to the newly elected council.

“That is for me the bottom line. For them to rush it through now is a demonstration of bad faith,” he said.

In his response to Niehaus, Hlabisa referred to legislation governing the appointment of municipal managers and managers directly accountable to them.

He said municipal councils were responsible for making these appointments and had to submit prescribed reports to the provincial MEC responsible for local government for compliance assessment and onward reporting to the minister.

Hlabisa said he had not been formally informed of the alleged mass appointments in Mangaung.

He added that the law did not require his prior concurrence or approval for municipal staff appointments.

His department was engaging the Free State provincial department responsible for local government to verify the allegations and establish the facts.

Hlabisa said allegations of possible cadre deployment, electioneering through the state or attempts to bind an incoming council had not been established.

Mangaung Municipality's acting general manager for communication, Nicolette Maysiels, said the municipality had advertised the positions and conducted the recruitment process within the applicable laws.

However, it had decided to defer finalising the appointments until the new council was constituted.

“This decision was guided by the principle of fairness and the need to ensure that the incoming council is afforded the opportunity to assume its responsibilities without being prejudiced by appointments finalised immediately before the transition to a new council term,” Maysiels said.

She said the recruitment process had been initiated in response to concerns raised by the Auditor-General about the municipality's high vacancy rate and sustained overtime expenditure over the past decade.

Maysiels said deferring the appointments did not invalidate the recruitment process already undertaken.

“The process will be considered for finalisation after the new council has been constituted, subject to the applicable legislation, recruitment policies and procedures.”

The debate over municipal appointments also comes against the backdrop of previous disputes over the suitability and legality of senior appointments, including a challenge to three senior eThekwini municipal appointments.

Last month, Hlabisa told the Cogta committee that legislation provides for a municipal manager's contract to overlap by one year between administrations.

“There must be one year overlapping to ensure that he or she manages the transition from the old council to the new council. There is no municipal manager who is employed more than a year after the elections, and that is determined by the law,” he said.