Nkosikhulule Nyembezi
Cape Town - I breathed a sigh of relief as I digested newspaper headlines announcing that the City of Tshwane has a mayor after weeks of political instability.
On March 28, DA caucus leader and former party MP Cilliers Brink won the mayoral election against Cope’s sole councillor Ofentse Moalusi.
Indeed, it has been many weeks of political instability, and Brink has succeeded the embattled on-and-off former Cope councillor Dr Murunwa Makwarela.
Makwarela resigned on March 10 after the public found that he submitted a fake insolvency rehabilitation certificate to city manager Johann Mettler to cling onto the mayoral chain.
Makwarela did not qualify to be a councillor following a 2016 declaration of insolvency by the Gauteng High Court, Pretoria.
An act of what might be called unethical behaviour on Makwarela’s part was just one of many incidents in a terrible accident involving the abuse of power by corrupt politicians bent on improving their fortunes at the expense of the people.
First, Cope failed to take full responsibility for unlawfully including an ineligible candidate in their party candidate list and, upon being exposed, to implement remedial steps promptly.
This subversion of the law and undermining of the electorate is widespread across political parties. It has far-reaching repercussions for our democracy as the electorate increasingly sees political parties as a liability.
Even the yet-to-be-promulgated electoral reforms to open space for independent candidates to contest elections at national and provincial levels are unlikely to significantly impact all citizens in the early years of operation, given the behavioural changes that must first occur.
However, they add to our hope for restoring accountability in our democracy, as they gradually phase in to shape the outcome of by-elections for national and provincial legislative seats.
Second, there have always been high tensions between political parties in coalition governments nationwide.
At some point, at Tshwane House, the EFF stormed the outgoing mayor’s office early this year, demanding all members of the mayoral committee and political staff vacate municipal offices.
They claimed that the Municipal Structures Act required a dissolution of the mayoral committee after the mayor had resigned.
These disruption actions are deplorable, coming from public representatives. Spending tens of thousands of rands a year convening meetings to elect-dismiss-elect municipal council leaders that favour a small fraction of political parties in council can serve no conceivable good.
The big concern is that instability in municipal councils is widespread as political parties continue to ignore the electoral mandate to govern in partnership.
South Africa’s electoral system is obsessed with political parties, unlike any other democracy-supporting structures in our maturing constitutional democracy.
The quality of candidates fielded by political parties is so bad that an increasing number of the voting population stays away from voting because of mistrust of politicians.
Over half of the political parties in municipal councils have no appetite for working together in a stable coalition government.
One reason is that many politicians have a mentality of entitlement to squander public funds. Any hint that voters might replace them in their cosy gravy train seats invokes nightmares of being rendered unemployable. They mistakenly consider holding political office as their privilege for life.
Yet, holding political office should be about public service and promoting constitutional values. It should be no patronage tool for political parties and should not be abused.
It is impossible to see what public good it serves to political manoeuvre by elbowing out those who are supposed to be partners because politicians, once elected to office, assume the responsibility of being public representatives, including those who did not vote in an election.
The continuing refusal of political parties to cooperate cannot prevent accidents like the ones of Makwarela, Western Cape Kannaland Municipality mayor Jeffrey Donson, North West Lekwa-Teemane Municipality mayor and speaker, Mpho Pilane, Oudtshoorn Municipality deputy mayor Mlandeli Nyuka. We can only see what lessons can be drawn when one occurs.
As for co-operative governance, elected representatives are enjoined by the Constitution to co-operate in mutual trust and good faith by fostering friendly relations and assisting and supporting one another. They must also do so by informing and consulting one another on matters of common interest, coordinating their actions and legislation, adhering to agreed procedures, and avoiding legal proceedings against one another.
Last year, the government announced revised plans to prevent public representatives and civil servants from doing business with the government and to protect whistle-blowers who expose corruption.
Still, it might first inquire into why these have failed in the past.
Year in and year out, the auditor-general has reported serious financial irregularities in government, which are another manifestation of the many weeks of political instability in Tshwane and other dysfunctional municipalities across the country.
Many South Africans have contested their effectiveness. They were breached in almost half of all cases, rendering perpetrators liable to years of imprisonment only if the political parties that deployed the individuals concerned and law-enforcement authorities cared to act.
Meanwhile, politicians continue to ignore the most likely cause of a rise in unethical and criminal incidents, including the political killings of individuals fighting corruption.
Records show an increasing number of killings for contesting elections, reporting corruption, refusing to sign for irregularly issued tenders and becoming a witness in criminal trials against politically connected individuals.
An expert in criminal law tells me none of this would have led to death in the country had it not been for greed and corruption.
It is now a dismissible offence that could subject a person to a polygraph test to vote in a legislative body for decisions that should advance the public good and not only narrow political interests.
South Africa’s obsession with political parties is counter-productive and cruel to the people’s wishes. There are better ways to elect and hold accountable public representatives, including a meaningful inclusion of independent candidates.
Nyembezi is a researcher, policy analyst and human rights activist
Cape Times