ANC Falters Again In Largest Eastern Cape Metro

With the ANC only getting thirty-two seats in last week's polls, the worst showing for the party since the metropolitan municipality was established in 2000, it has the almost insurmountable task of getting coalition partners with at least 29 seats to join a coalition arrangement.

It is very different from the eighty-one seats the ANC secured in 2006 when the Nelson Mandela Bay Municipality was known for scooping up international awards for innovation and governance.

In 2005, the biggest metro in the Eastern Cape won World Leadership Awards when its Red Location Museum of Struggle won the Architecture & Civil Engineering category and the Town Planning category for its Sustainable Community Planning concept.

In 2007, former Executive Mayor Nondumiso Maphazi followed in the footsteps of her predecessor Nceba Faku by walking on the World Leadership Awards stage in London, England to accept the award for the Best African City.

If you include the national architectural award for the Nelson Mandela Bay Stadium and the numerous cleanest city awards and clean audits, the Nelson Mandela Bay Municipality thrived.

While its glory days were evident, the start of its rapid decline was even more so.

Due to constant infighting, factionalism, reports alleging corruption and the amount for unauthorised, irregular, and wasteful expenditure increasing, the ANC lost the confidence of its base.

In 2011, the ANC only managed to get sixty-three seats in council. This was followed by fifty seats in 2016, forty-eight in 2021 and now the dismal thirty-two.

A lack of consequence management and efforts to reach out to the electorate to address their needs, beyond its own membership and ANC die-hards, did not do the party any good.

Toilet tender

The Nelson Mandela Bay Municipality City Manager Noxolo Nqwazi and Mvuleni Mapu, former human settlements director and prospective MKP councillor still face charges in the Commercial Crimes Court regarding a R24,6 million toilet tender awarded during the COVID19 pandemic.

Former ANC Nelson Mandela Bay regional secretary, Luyolo Nqakula, who was also an accused in the matter, successfully applied to have charges against him dismissed. This is but one of the many scandals that weigh heavy on the ANC in the court of public opinion, the most important forum when the election cycle comes around.

Newcomers successful

New entrants such as the South African Communist Party (4 seats), Umkhonto Wesizwe Party (2), Mayibuye Civic Movement (2), Mayibuye (1), Democratic Movement (1) and the United Progressive People Alliance (1) did not improve the ANC’s fortunes.

While it is a mathematical possibility to form a coalition government, it seems unlikely that the ANC will be able to get a coalition agreement in place due to its track record of undermining the voices of coalition partners, but especially since the party did not name a specific mayoral candidate as yet.

ANC Indecision

On top of that, the two named candidates, Babalwa Lobishe and Andile Lungisa, have chequered track records, making it difficult for potential coalition partners to sell them to their respective constituencies.

Lungisa served jail time for being involved in a brawl in the council chambers in 2016 and Lobishe took unprecedented steps to shush her coalition partners from making public statements without her consent or implicit approval.

A direct instruction to senior municipal staff to disobey the Deputy Executive Mayor Gary van Niekerk during a mayoral committee meeting, also did not cover her in glory.

Lobishe also did not shrug the scrutiny after unilaterally approving the rental of a transformer to a private company without a council decision on the matter.

While coalition talks are taking place behind the scenes, the Democratic Alliance only need partners with eight seats to supplement its 53 seats attained during the election, making their negotiations much more manageable.

However, the residents of the Nelson Mandela Bay Municipality will certainly hope for mature heads to prevail in order to get the only municipality in the world, named after political icon Nelson Mandela, back on track.