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The ANC-Compatriots of South Africa (CSA) alliance has already started to show how little it cares about the financial state of the Dr Beyers Naude Local Municipality.

During a council meeting yesterday, the Democratic Alliance (DA), Freedom Front Plus (FF Plus) and EFF took the decision not to send a councillor to the South African Local Government Association (SALGA) Conference in Cape Town. This decision was taken in an effort to save money for the cash-strapped municipality.  It was agreed that, while important, spending tens of thousands of rands in travel, accommodation and subsistence cannot be justified right now.

The ANC, however, do not seem to share the concerns of the DA and its coalition partners and ANC Cllr Willem Safers proposed that his ANC colleague, Cllr Xolile Galada, attend the SALGA Conference. This despite SALGA clearly indicating that either the Mayor, Speaker or Chief Whip of the Council be selected to attend.  This proposal was put to the vote and with the CSA Speaker having the casting vote, the 12-12 deadlock was settled in favour of the ANC.

This clearly demonstrates that the ANC and CSA have absolutely no interest in providing clean, accountable governance as they are willing to waste money that could be used for service delivery on unnecessary travel and entertainment. While our communities are battling to meet their monthly account payments, the ANC is taking their hard-earned money and using it to go on road trips that do not directly benefit our citizens.

Once municipal committees begin meeting, we will be reviewing the finance policies to ensure that when there are financial constraints, austerity measures can include curbing travel and subsistence for public representatives and officials for non-critical purposes.

The DA is appalled at this blatant abuse of power and wilful wastage of money.  We will continue to work harder towards better service delivery and financial management, even though the ANC-CSA coalition wants to see us fail. Our commitment to the people of Dr Beyers Naude will not change.

Issued by Cllr Ricardo Smith - Dr Beyers Naude Municipality Chief Whip