Nikki Moore
An Inkatha Freedom Party councillor in the town of Mandeni, on the Zululand coast, is in trouble over alleged racist remarks made during a public meeting.
And a row has erupted between the African National Congress and the IFP that has plunged the local government of this troubled Zululand region an industrial hub and political flashpoint into yet another crisis.
David Simelane is alleged to have said, in Zulu: ”We are sick and tired of crime. People should not steal from their own people, people should steal from whites because they are rich. I have said it, now go and report me.”
The remarks caused an immediate storm. ANC councillors demanded that Simelane be disciplined. The IFP mayor of the town council, Makhosonke Ntuli, has refused to address the issue.
According to ANC councillor Sam Zwane, whenever this matter appears on the council agenda IFP members stage a walk-out or disrupt the meeting so that it is never discussed.
Simelane denies that he ever uttered those words.
”I have been deliberately misquoted by my political opponents,” he says. ”The ANC is bitter because I resigned from their party to join the IFP.”
Zwane claims that he has the utterances on tape.
”Simelane was expelled from the ANC for misconduct. Now he is embarrassing the IFP. But the IFP is pretending that nothing has happened. We have called for an investigation into this councillor’s conduct, but we are being ignored.”
Aside from the controversy over the alleged racist remarks, this impasse is just another episode in the town council that has lurched from one crisis to the next since local government elections last year.
Town management has been unable to function for eight months because of political infighting. A leadership struggle in the council lasted for five months and the neighbouring industrial development, Isithebe, is teetering on the brink of collapse.
Eskom threatened to cut off the town’s electricity last month because of an unpaid bill and the council is in deadlock over the election of a new councillor. Rates arrears have run into millions of rands, faction fighting and crime have led to capital flight and councillors have allegedly set up employment agencies that only find work for card-carrying IFP members.
”This place has become a circus,” says Zwane. ”We have asked the provincial minister, Nyanga Ngubane, to intervene. And if he does not do so we will be approaching the national minister to help us. We cannot go on like this. The whole region will soon collapse.”