Feeling abandoned by the party they helped bring into power and angered by conditions in townships, the Northern Cape’s Independent Party is ”praying” for the African National Congress to lose Wednesday’s local government election.
”I pray that the ANC will lose. We feel that you failed us. I was part of the people who helped the ANC win in 1994,” one of the party’s two candidates said on Monday.
Speaking from the party’s home in Bongani township in Gordon, Julia Josi said the local ANC-led council is ignoring the local pool of labour and hiring contractors for building projects. The party sprang from a concerned residents’ group in 2005.
Josi said municipal officials live in Kimberley and are given a travel allowance for the daily 100km drive to work. ”Why don’t they use local people?” she asked.
The nearby Hester Malan hospital is in such desperate need of funds that patients have to bring their own bedding.
Residents in the local Skerpioenland area had been promised that the bucket system, used where homes have no sewerage pipes, would be removed.
”Last year they dug holes for sewerage pipes and then filled them up again, because there was no money,” said Josi.
Apart from a 100m stretch of road that has been paved at the entrance to the township, the other roads are all untarred.
”What’s happening with the money for the roads?
”I don’t want to forget about the people. They must always say what they want from council members. We only get visits from ANC members at election time.
”Then they sit in their offices and forget about us.”
She said party supporters who have attended regular weekly meetings at the local community hall have been told by ANC members that if they do not vote for the ruling party, they will lose their pensions and child-support grants.
Party organiser Lemfvea van Niekerk said she became disillusioned by parties failing to deliver services.
”We are here to deliver services. Ons is plat op die aarde [We are down to earth].”
She said the party will not make promises, but will ensure that projects make use of local labour.
”We are not promising housing, but will ensure that when there is money it will go to housing.” She said council members who do not play their part within a year should be replaced. — Sapa