The FF Plus's campaign against the ANC's intended re-demarcation of four municipalities in North West to turn the Rustenburg Local Municipality (RLM) into a metro gained widespread support from communities.
By this morning, after the campaign had been running for several days, more than 4 000 individual petitions of protest had been delivered to the FF Plus's office in Rustenburg.
The FF Plus will submit these petitions of protest on Friday the 28th of April to the Municipal Demarcation Board (MDB) in Rustenburg.
During an earlier municipal council meeting, the FF Plus was the only party that objected to the re-demarcation and amalgamation. Other parties, like the DA and EFF, supported the proposals.
The re-demarcation will see the entire Kgetlengrivier Local Municipality (Koster, Swartruggens and Derby), and large portions of the Madibeng Local Municipality (Brits, Hartbeespoort and Mooinooi) and the Moses Kotane Local Municipality (Ledig and Sun City) incorporated into the RLM.
With such an enormous area expansion and the consequent increase in the number of residents, the area will be classified as a metropolis, which would bring about a substantive increase in municipal councillors' salaries.
This may be the reason why all the parties in the RLM municipal council, apart from the FF Plus, supported the ANC's proposals.
Incorporating areas traditionally known for having lots of ANC support into the RLM could be an attempt by the party to maintain control over it.
At present, the ANC can only govern this Municipality with the support of smaller parties in the council.
Creating such a colossal and clumsy municipal bureaucracy will paralyse service delivery in the area even further.
Centralising services in Rustenburg, which is very far from communities like Koster, Groot Marico, Ledig and Mooinooi, makes no operational sense.
It also poses the real risk of facilitating more widespread corruption by the ANC and its deployed cadres.
The ANC, the MDB and all councillors of other parties must take note of the strong opposition from the affected communities supporting the FF Plus's campaign against this attempt at self-enrichment and promoting personal political interests.
Various interest groups, like Sakeliga, AfriForum, the local media and community organisations in rural areas, have also expressed their support for the FF Plus's campaign.
The campaign's success highlights the power of communities in making a concerted effort to stand up against the ANC's political abuses.
The residents of the RLM, Madibeng, Kgetlengrivier and Moses Kotane deserve better than the ANC.
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