The FF Plus welcomes the recently issued regulations and code of conduct for municipal councillors which determine, among other things, that councillors who disrupt municipalities and incite communities to participate in unlawful conduct will from now on be prosecuted.
The Minister of Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs (COGTA), Thembi Nkadimeng, issued these regulations in terms of the Local Government: Municipal Systems Amendment Act.
These regulations clearly stipulate that councillors who “incite communities to participate in violent protests” should be criminally prosecuted. It also includes incitement to strike by municipal officials.
It, furthermore, stipulates that any damage incurred by municipalities due to councillors’ unlawful conduct should be recovered from those councillors. Such damages may from now on not be written off either.
This legislation now compels municipalities and the police to investigate such matters thoroughly, and to ensure that the guilty councillors are brought to book.
The actions of ANC and EFF councillors, in particular, who incite violence for political gain have been affecting municipalities for a long time. Such unlawful actions have caused millions of rand worth of structural and infrastructure damage to municipal assets.
Inciting communities to unlawfully occupy land also frequently results in long drawn-out and expensive legal battles to have the occupants removed. All paid for by law-abiding taxpayers.
The FF Plus will apply pressure in municipalities countrywide to ensure that the provisions of the regulations are followed to the letter.
Law-abiding citizens being held hostage and disrupted by the unlawful actions of self-serving ANC and EFF councillors should no longer be allowed.
South Africans deserve better than the ANC.
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