The New National Party (NNP) on Thursday threatened to lay criminal charges against two Democratic Alliance (DA) unicity councillors in Cape Town, who apparently instituted legal action against the council on behalf of their party earlier in the week.
NNP local government representative Pierre Uys, who is also the city’s deputy-mayor elect, said the two councillors were practising attorneys.
”In terms of section 30(3) of the Municipal Ordinance, it is a criminal offence for a councillor to act directly or indirectly as an advocate or attorney against the council in any legal proceedings.”
Uys said the matter would be reported to the police, the provincial local government MEC, the city manager and the Cape Law Society.
”Their actions may have far-reaching consequences to both their political and professional careers,” he said.
The DA councillors in question were not immediately available for comment. Uys confirmed the DA had applied to the Cape High Court on Wednesday for the setting aside of the city’s executive committee, its Rules Portfolio Committee and its Sub-Councils Establishment Portfolio Committee.
”They claim four seats on the Executive Committee instead of the two allocated to them. They further asked for an order preventing the Executive Committee from meeting and the Members of the Executive Committee from taking any decisions.
”Bearing in mind that the City of Cape Town may only have a collective executive system which entitles other parties to be represented on the Executive Committee for another few weeks until an executive mayoral system can be implemented, the Democratic Alliance’s applications to the High Court smacks of serving the self-interest of certain of their members.”
Uys accused the DA of willing to sacrifice proper service delivery in the city for allowing some of the members to enjoy a temporary financial windfall by serving on the executive committee until it was dissolved.
”This latest attempt by the litigious Democratic Alliance to once again frustrate government, and (the) wasting (of) valuable resources on unnecessary and pointless litigation, finally puts pay (sic) to their publicly stated commitment to proper service delivery.”
The NNP would oppose the court application to ensure the executive committee met on Friday to take crucial decisions. – Sapa